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The Intuitive Flow
The EDGE Interview with Visionary Artist Barry Sharplin
by Tim Miejan
It's one thing to walk by a finished painting hanging on a wall, and it's quite another
to enter the painting with your soul and become a part of it. Visionary artist Barry
Sharplin, who contributed his piece "The Magician" for the May cover of
The EDGE, and "Mayan Steps" this month, says most viewers of art don't
take the time to truly appreciate what it is they are seeing.
As for his intentions, look no farther than Buddhist approaches to creativity.
"To me, painting is an act of kindness," Sharplin says. "This is partly
because I take the Boddhisatva vow very seriously in the Buddhist teaching, which
is to work for the benefit of others. Being a painter, I've trained myself to view
the making of a visual work of art to be a positive influence for a lot of human
beings.
"One way that I've supported myself to keep unfolding is seeing the process
of creativity as an act of sheer generosity. It's a generous act. It's a giving act.
It's opening up the generous mind, generous thinking, generous views, an act of giving.
And I've found by focusing on that and questioning how that can be and unfolding
that and allowing that to arise that it has really transformed the creative process.
Of course, opening up the inner responsiveness is important to that."
Sharplin, a native New Zealander, and his American wife, Cleo, live in rural Pennsylvania,
not far from the New Jersey border. It is here where ideas are born, and where the
couple can enjoy nature and replenish the creative spark. Down the road, in Frenchtown,
N.J., is where they display their work -- his paintings and their hand-dyed, hand-painted
clothing designs -- at the Alchemy Creative Clothing shop and studio.
The couple met in New Zealand, where Cleo lived for several years. He persuaded her
to go back to the States in 1992, and they've been here ever since, first in Taos
and now on the East Coast. They still have their original Alchemy Creative Clothing
shop in Taos.
Sharplin spoke with The EDGE by phone from his home.
When and how did you start painting?
Barry Sharplin: I kind of have it in my memory bank supposedly that I was really
around 8 or 9 years old. I was given this coloring book, and that's really a bright
first memory about how much I enjoyed creating with colors. It was really from then
on that I've been creating art.
By the time I reached junior high, which is called Intermediate over in New Zealand,
I was totally devoted to art. I did my first school mural then, and they could see
that I was very interested in art and I thoroughly enjoyed it. By the time I got
to high school, I was working on canvases. After school, I would just paint my little
heart out, you know. I think with me in school I was pretty shy and I tried to avoid
a lot of usual kind of social things. I think part of it was because I was kind of
shy, introverted. By the time I finished high school, I had a fine art preliminary,
which gave me a grant to go to art school. I went to art school for three years and
have been on from there.
What role did your parents play in supporting you in that?
Sharplin: When I talk to other people, I feel I was lucky. By the time I left
home, my dad's garage, where he puts his cars, looked like Jackson Pollack from corner
to corner, the concrete floor. He never once did anything about this. My parents
were always very supportive.
How has your painting changed over the years?
Sharplin: Sometimes I go back to when I was around 15, 16, 17, 18 and into the
early 20s, and I see that I was into the relationships of forms and space and color.
I was happy to do figurative and representational work. I learned how to draw, and
I could draw the human figure with all the shading and all the soft musculature,
thanks to art school. I was pretty good with that.
But, my natural tendency was always to move over more into the abstract, for want
of a better word. In my early 20s, I met a highly regarded teacher within the Buddhist
path and I studied with him and other students, and traveled with them some. That's
where I learned how to meditate.
What effect did that have on your art?
Sharplin: I think it's had the biggest effect of all, because I could see that
art could go far. It wasn't limited to a decorative realm. It wasn't limited to a
political realm even. It had a breadth and a scope that became apparent. And since
then, even to this point, my life is very much with painting as a way to open the
mind and become integrated.
All the painters I know and the reading that I've done about other painters suggests
that there's a natural inclination, a natural impulse, to create a work that has
integrated the parts to the whole. There's harmony. There's a wholeness to the picture's
surface. What meditation taught me was to bring those ideas into more of a personal
experience.
I had a teacher once who emphasized, right at the beginning of the course, that "it's
more important to become a work of art, than merely produce one." That's really
like a koan, or a question I've explored for many, many years, and still am. It relates
to every aspect of art, whether you're painting a landscape, a flower or a square
or a triangle. The physical activity of expressing one's self through a work of art
is, for me, very much to do with empathy -- having an empathy for the forms and shapes
and colors.
I'm getting a sense that what you're talking about is that you become a part of
what it is you're painting. You develop a relationship with what develops on your
canvas.
Sharplin: Yes. The painter and what is being painted are not so separate anymore.
And I've learned and discovered this through the Buddhist path. Jung's path also
is very similar.
As humans, we have a body with all the senses. We have our feelings. We also have
our states of mind, which changes every moment. The body is sensing, and we are thinking
and feeling. And then we have intuition. My approach has been to try and weave all
of those together, to explore the integration of body and feelings, idea thinking
(intellect) and the intuitive.
I've found that art, expressive art -- dancing, writing, music -- is exquisitely
therapeutic. It releases. It's an energy flowing. One doesn't feel like one's paralyzed
or stuck. The creative flow is shared throughout the body. The therapeutic aspect
can be emotional, There's a lot of painting that's done with tremendous angst, for
example. A lot of creativity, like expression, can be maybe insane even, you know?
I believe every action in creative expression is an attempt to clear, to move, to
unfold. The therapeutic process of expressing the emotions is an essential part of
this process, like putting on a piece of music really loud and just immersing yourself
in it. Maybe that's what Jackson Pollack was doing.
But there are always extremes of expression, which are therapeutic. On the other
spectrum you have art that can be kind of a shallow decoration. People can feel peaceful,
emotionally released, calm and tranquil. A retired person may begin painting, because
it's a peaceful, pleasant activity.
The more I've discovered and explored and questioned the alliances between meditative
states and expressiveness, I find it can move beyond the cruder forms of expression,
beyond like angst and into a much more wholeness, an openness.
The mind is not stationary; it's flowing. When we experience intuition, it's peaceful,
but at the same time it's energetic. It's not a trance-like state; it's an energetic,
passionate state, as well, because the body's involved and the senses are involved.
It's like standing on the bridge, being centered. The same principles of yoga can
come into creating a painting or writing, becoming calm, becoming centered, breathing,
feeling peaceful, opening up these energies, allowing the intuitive to flow through
the body and the feelings in an integrated way.
Is connecting up with that energetic, intuitive flow essential to your art as
it is?
Sharplin: Yes. I think one reason for that relates to what Carl Jung said about
the four main functions of our beings. He basically said that when our senses, our
feelings and our thinking are flowing together, when you become aware of your sensing,
feeling and thinking, the intuitive function automatically comes alive. In other
words, he said we don't have to develop our intuition. All we need to do is integrate
feeling, thinking and sensing -- and the intuitive automatically opens up. So in
that sense, painting becomes an exploration.
So it's a process that allows you to integrate your feeling, thinking and sensing?
Sharplin: Yes. The four functions of sensing, feeling, thinking and intuiting
come together like a cross of integration.
Is that the idea behind your signature logo, representing the four parts and how
it seems to be in motion?
Sharplin: Yes. I play around with it. I put it in different positions. Sometimes
the cross is horizontal; sometimes it's diagonal. It's like studying the ancient
practices of working with the mandala. The classic form of the mandala is the circle,
which is our primary symbol for wholeness, the experience of wholeness.
Visual art, painting, is a language that is as clear as writing and music. It's a
very clear language. I think there's a tremendous amount of work to do today to try
and educate people about that. Because of society and education, and maybe
lack of support for creative development as we grow up as children, a lot of people
have not been encouraged or supported to understand that language and to look at
art as more than what it is a picture of.
People looking at art usually think of the final product rather than the journey.
Sharplin: Yes, and the journey is the language. It's how the brush stroke communicates
information, REAL information. The common way to look at it is that it's at a pre-verbal
state, but it's more than that. The image is speaking to levels of our being out
of which language grew. The deeper language is in writing, too. Visible writing goes
deeper than the actual mark on the page. The marks that are being made are intelligent
communication, and potentially it can communicate wisdom. The idea in Sanskrit, the
lettering in ancient languages, was that they were more energetic in construction,
because their language was coming from a deeper or a higher place.
In order to accurately read the language in a painting, does the viewer have to
be in the flow, with feeling, sensing and intellect, just like the artist who created
the piece?
Sharplin: We're in a very visual age now. We're bombarded. I watch people today
as they peruse visual art, walking by so quickly. My biggest wish in the world right
now is for all of us when we see a painting or a visual work of art to stop, relax,
center ourselves in our bodies, become aware of our feelings, open the mind and get
into the painting. Practice a bit of yoga for a couple of seconds and allow the visual
work to speak. Flip between being the observer and the picture, yourself and what
you're looking at, by relaxing and opening up and becoming aware of the body. Let
the feelings dissolve. It's a natural thing to have happen.
You become part of the art work.
Sharplin: You allow yourself to enter it -- and it to enter you. This was the
ancient idea of creating a mandala. It was to awaken the inner mandala, the spiritual
aspects of our beings. We've forgotten the experience of just what this feels like.
We know it when we blow bubbles. When we look at a bubble, we have a feeling. We
usually feel good, positive. The bubble is an archetype. Bubble is deep. It goes
beyond culture. It's in the genes. These shapes and colors and symbols and archetypes
are all flowing. They are like the sacred geometry of everything.
The way I like to say it is, if we all sat down and put on a CD to listen to a six-minute
composition of music, let us close our eyes. Just relax. For just those six minutes,
be absorbed and feel these ecstasies, or feel the passion or feel the movement or
the delicacy. We would enter into the music. But today, when people look at a piece
of art, they look at it and glance and move on. They give it about one or two seconds.
That doesn't allow for that process to transform.
I can look at a painting and have almost an instant reading. Sometimes it takes me
a bit longer. For people who have a yearning to unfold their appreciation of visual
art, the easiest thing is to give a painting several minutes. Just absorb it as you
would a piece of music -- and then you'll have the experience the artist intended.
You'll have your own experience, maybe something the artist had no idea he was creating.
People have shown me things in my paintings that I never knew.
Is the trend in art that is integrating itself with soul and spirit helping people
to enter that realm of visual arts that you describe?
Sharplin: Yes. The best of the new age movement is really very old age. It's
very ancient knowledge coming out in new forms. For example, the images of the basic
tarot deck are very antiquated. Many of those images are outdated now. I have my
next five-year project is to paint a new tarot deck.
When I evaluate or critique a painting, I usually do it from the point of view that
I approach my work. I look at how the brush stroke is being made, rather than what
it is a picture of. That gives me more of a reading of the energy, the state of mind,
the feeling of the painter. We're becoming the work of art. We're allowing ourselves
to become that. A lot of the visual work in the New Age field is opening people's
imaginations. It's reopening the imaginative, the dream level. It's working with
symbols, archetypes. But, a painting to me is more about the energy. When I'm very
tired or I'm not having such a good day, my brush strokes will reflect my state.
I think it's important for our new future of spiritual integration as humans to be
grounded, as well as in the cosmos.
Do you receive the feeling and the energy of the painting in your body or even
an image of what the final product will look like before you paint, or does the image
reveal itself as you create?
Sharplin: Both. I've trained myself to begin a painting in a state of clarity.
It's very much like a musician who would find his peace and path in music. I try
from the first brush stroke to be coming from as much of a peaceful and balanced
place that I can, and then hopefully the process will deepen as the painting unfolds.
I'll have a bland canvas and it's much like switching on the internal imaginative
function, the intuitive. If I want to invoke a radiant principle or a principle of
light, I will internalize and visualize that, and often out of that will come compositions
or constructions. They're like structurings in space. From that I would discern through
feelings and exploration of what these symbols mean and how they feel and how they
are experienced and the body feelings involved.
You see it from the foundation and then the more subtle layers are applied after
that.
Sharplin: The colors, the textures, all this comes after. When light is split
up through a prism, what're closer to the source are the schematics. Beautiful simplicity
has so much power and potential. That's the reason I paint, my prime motivation.
I feel it is a communication to other people. To me, they're very beautiful, they're
very sublime. There's a correctness to them. It's like a fine piece of music. There's
something about the precision of a composition that has such a profound effect on
our beings when we take it in, and we become aware of things.
I enjoy creating the structure on the canvas, the composition, exploring the very,
very delicate ratios and relationships that are there. That's why I've enjoyed studying
sacred geometry, because the harmonies and the ratios exist in nature. They're very
real in how they affect our bodies and minds. They're very direct.
You have begun to paint soul portraits for people. When did that begin and what
do you feel they offer people?
Sharplin: When I began studying with Namgyal Rinpoche in my early 20s. He taught
me that people, just like in astrology, have an archetypal guide. Everyone has a
particular nature. In the Buddhist path, your teacher will give you your guiding
essential spiritual nature. There is an energy or a shaping to it, and they've recognized
it. There are hundreds of them. People would start to come to me and ask me to paint
their thanka, a picture of their Tibetan deity. I would always begin with the sacred
geometry construction of the figure and then feature the different symbols. It was
all very classical.
The Tibetans have been doing it for centuries and centuries, and it hasn't changed.
A Tibetan rinpoche who was visiting New Zealand saw one of my paintings. He recognized
the deity and thought it was very unusual because I've gotten away from the classical
treatment. I'd given it a Western face and a different interpretation. I like change
and evolution. Moving into the future and not hanging onto the past. So that's how
it really started.
Do you sense that we're all artists, by nature?
Sharplin: It's not a question of becoming aware of or creating something and
making yourself become. It's becoming aware of what is already occurring. This energy
-- Divine, integrating, awakening energy -- that all spiritual thinkers understand
and acknowledge has its deepest expressions in all the fields of art, like the notes
of music and the arrangements, the marks of painting and the colors, the language
of writing and the meaning. The deepest spiritual seekers and explorers have recognized
that human creativity and creating art in all fields is natural.
What disturbs me is when people say they can't draw, that they can't paint. If you
have your functions with you, everyone can dance and drum and sing when the mood
takes them. It's the same with drawing on a piece of paper. It makes me very sad
to hear people say they can't do that. As long as you have something. If you can
dance, you can have that. You have that potential for that connectedness, not just
the technical exercise. It's self-liberating and can take us into that curious, questioning
realm where everything is interesting and the concerns of everyday life disappear.
There are a lot of people who have not gone there.
Sharplin: I used to do a lot of workshops in New Zealand. We'd find a place and
be comfy and bring in carloads of food and camping and tenting and do art retreats,
and they were always just so much fun. People went away from these courses with newfound
confidence in drawing and painting or using pastels or whatever. Often, the retreats
would lead into writing, even doing plays and reciting poetry and become very eclectic.
People's creative juices got flowing.
All it needs for that to happen is the right supportive circumstances, the right
conditions. It's not the use of therapy. It's just finding the right supportive conditions
in your life and it will naturally unfold.
Barry Sharpin can be contacted at 17 Bridge St., Frenchtown, NJ 08825. Call (908)
996-9000, e-mail barrysharplin@hotmail.com or go to www.barrysharplin.com. For more on Alchemy Creative Clothing,
go to www.alchemyclothing.com
Tim Miejan is editor of The EDGE. Contact him at (651) 578-8969 or editor@edgenews.com
Copyright (c) 2002 Tim Miejan
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