Thank you to Coffeehouse on Cherry Street for hosting my Pachamama Exhibit for your fall event. Many thanks to Cheri Asher who encouraged me to feature the llamas I photographed in Peru (among portraits and landscape photos, too) but also for teaching me how to make an artist story and several other details. Jonny and Kyle were so helpful, too.  I appreciate everyone who attended and many thanks to my husband who wired each canvas to prepare them to be hung by Cheri. My son, Mark, drove in from KU to support his mama and I loved having him there. On his way into Tulsa, John’s car broke down an hour away from campus and he experienced his first car tow with Triple A back to campus with Luke to the rescue, too. Many firsts this weekend!

Attached are some explanations of the exhibit and photos of some of the guests who attended. Patrick was unable to take photos of all 60 guests who came but THANK YOU so much to everyone who attended. It meant so much to me. The exhibit is still up until Dec. 2 so I won’t post gallery pictures/canvases here in case anyone is able to go by CHOCS to see it.

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PACHAMAMA

The canvases displayed are assembled to convey Pachamama; the Mother Earth mythology. While other photos are meaningful to me or have stronger photographic content, these particular ones work together to convey the four cosmological principles of Pachamama’s spirit; (sun, moon, water, stone) colliding in nature. Recent travels to various continents revealed a search for the mother spirit before I even learned about Pachamama/Mother Earth.

Adding to that, our hometown Tulsa being on the historic “Mother Road” of Route 66 called to be included with its own iconic imagery. Growing up in a neighborhood and church along the Mother Road/Route 66 and attending college at University of Tulsa, also along the Mother Road, makes me sentimental for this connection. After decades of artistic activity being mostly for my students and my sons’ projects, it is liberating and enriching to now delve into my own art projects, catharsis, and experiments.

From the landforms of Iceland to  Peru, Northern to Southern Hempispheres, the same passion for environmentalism was demonstrated. Standing at a point where two tectonic plates divided (in Iceland) and all of the other glorious natural phenomena that I witnessed, I became fascinated with lyrics in Icelandic Bjork’s songs. Basalt, lava, crystalline, tectonic plates were not just metaphorical imagery. To discover them again in other lands enlightened my awareness to environmentalism. Philosophizing with a naturalist guide in Costa Rica, I expressed to him, “If people saw this much natural beauty, they would be better stewards of the earth.” He instinctively responded, ‘You cannot love what you do not know.” His statement was so sincere and intimate it was as if he was speaking about a love affair…..a love affair with the earth. Mother Earth. Earth Mother. Pachamama.- Gina Michalopulos Kingsley

PACHAMAMA EXHIBIT

Thank you so much for coming to this exhibit. First of all, I want to thank Cheri! I submitted samples to be part of a corner gallery wall and she gave me the whole restaurant! I am still in the process of wanting to learn how to do mixed media applications and I can make any canvas abstract but this is a start. From Iceland to Peru and places in between……

Pachamama is explained on the artist stories. I could go very deeply into what it’s about but I’m even more interested in your questions and comments and interpretations of it on your own. There is the empty vessel way of teaching where I could fill you up with the info or there is the jigsaw puzzle paradigm where I present the pieces and have you put it together in your own analyses.  So, I’ll do a little of both tonight. Feel free to ask me questions about particular canvases or share with me your own info about them. The llamas are there for levity among the seriousness.

When I wrote my book, A Magic Carpet Ride, I discovered that I was searching for the mother spirit in my travels. I didn’t even know what or who Pachamama was until my most recent trip to Peru. Now, I’m seeing the connections between GAIA/GEA, Mother Earth, Pachamama, etc…and all the religious adaptations of it as cultures merged. Becoming so discouraged with politics, I became very comforted by the international philosophies and spiritual souvenirs I bring back from travels.

For example, other countries have sayings which embody their spirit— “Pura Vida” in Costa Rica, “Macabuca” in Cayman Islands, “Viva Cuba Libre” in Cuba, “Provecho” in Guatemala, “Yiasou and Yiamas” in Greece, “Hakuna Matata in some places of Africa”, “Salam Aleikum” in Morocco and “Pachamama” in Peru and S. America.

The angel canvas you see here symbolizes Pachamama to me because of two interpretations: when the Spaniards conquered the Inca territory of S. America where Pachamama the earth mother was “worshipped”, they let the indigenous people adapt their Spanish Catholic Virgin Mary into their Incan Pachamama. Likewise, in Cuba, when the Spaniards brought Nigerian slaves over, they let the Nigerians adapt their voodoo beliefs and spirit gods / orishas into their Catholicism by blending it into Santeria. When you look at that canvas, I interpret it as the Virgin Mary looking over the shoulder of the Santeria saint. The landscape photos represent the four cosmological principles: sun, moon, water, stone and the portraits are of people working with their environment. The man portraits are included because you can’t have a mama without a papa. There is no architecture included (except in the Route 66/ Mother Road canvases) so that it focuses on the natural environment, mostly. (As you enter CHOCS, the canvases in the entry way are of “the Mother Road/Route 66” and then when you enter the interior of the coffeehouse, they are of “the mother earth.” (from mother road to mother earth.)

Lastly, Jai Guru Deva Om; the lyric of the first song (“Across the Universe“) of my slideshow really jumped out to me as well as the second song, “Ray of Light’ because they are both about the universe. Ironically, Jai Guru Deva Om was a lyric John Lennon used to convey a meditation and thanks to his teacher/ guru Dev. By adding the “a” at the end “Deva” , it becomes feminine. “Om” is the natural vibration of the universe. Deva….Goddess is the Divine Mother of the universe. It was also to say, “thanks to my teacher who turns away the darkness with light.” Then, Madonna’s Ray of Light song seemed like the natural follow-up to that.

The Route 66 / Mother Road and Tulsa imagery on canvases in the entry way is to symbolize “mother road to mother earth” as you enter into the restaurant and gallery…..and that is explained as well on the artist stories.

Thank you so much for coming to this event. I have other features available…..travel catalogs, travel info referrals, and a Peruvian friend and expert on hand. A portion of my sales will go to Doctors without Borders and St. Judes; one international and one domestic charity.