DAY 200 – a reminder popped up on my phone in the early morning, saying “DAY 200” … I must have set it, when I started the project – one of the most unnecessary things I had done – there was no need for a reminder!
Anyway I am sure, when I did it and pictured that “day 200”, my vision was a different one!
Yesterday finally my period started, being late in my cycle for 5 days…. it came with a lot of pain last night. I recognized this before, it happens sometimes around full moons! So feeling quite dreadful this morning, I picked my inspiration of the day: Ilkim! Ilkim, with this amazing picture taken by her friend, the photographer Lilith Kugler, in the night of the blood moon and eclipse! Ilkim, whom I shared the room with during the retreat about a year ago, “when women blossom” – I mentioned this retreat before, it was somehow the key to unlock the artist inside me.
In the atelier I sat and sketched and sorted out once more my colour palette, blue, black, white … “easy to identify the colours today”, I thought, but in the end none of them made their way onto the paper. It was my blood! Puh, this costs a lot of courage to post here. (actually I needed for this last sentence a few minutes to type these four words). You may like it or not, this is your decision. It is not the first time, that I have painted with blood, just I didn’t feel like sharing here before – the reason why is, I guess, that it is something very sacred to me. Before publishing here today, I had the urge to share with Ilkim beforehand and she just encouraged me, to do whatever I feel to do.
Ok, so here is the blood moon painting, after this conversation:
Sitting with it, something felt missing or not right – and believe me, I sat with it for a long time and couldn’t figure it out, just a mini feeling came, that it might be related the shadow!
When my husband came home from work, I asked him, about his first impression – he said out of the blue, “I see a stork in the shadow” .. “a stork”, I said, “how?!?” …
We had dinner and I went back to the atelier. I tried to take off the shadow, which of course was not undoable, just it became a bit lighter … and then I saw my sewing machine! Remembering Ilkim’s words, I found myself a few seconds later in front of it!
I cannot explain what happened then, no plan, no sketching, the flow started stitch by stitch.
When it felt finished, I put the paper up on the wall and watched it from the distance – and there it was: a kind of stork had made it to the paper!! …but this of course is just one interpretation! 🙂
Thank you, Ilkim! Thank you for going with me through day 200 and your trust and encouragement!
My pain is gone!
<3 Susanne