Photography and spirituality | The Inner Path of Photography

March 4, 2015

“One More Chance”…My scroll hanging at Peter T. Brown Gallery

Below is the original post about my scroll wall hanging “As if in a dream…seaside contemplations.”

The exhibition will be up until March 12 – so I invite you to see my work and other wonderful images if you haven’t had a chance to do so. Enjoy…

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I’m pleased to share with you my latest scroll wall hanging,
“As if in a dream…seaside contemplations”

in the inaugural exhibition
“Over Time: Photography from the Advanced Photography Workshop”
Peter T. Brown Gallery, Houston, Texas.

I’m enjoying integrating my love of meditation, Japanese sensibilities, and beauty of the sea in my current work, and am happy to share this special hanging with you.

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“As if in a dream…seaside contemplations” is my contemporary interpretation of the art and intention of traditional scroll wall hangings created by Japanese Zen monks.

In Zenga (Zen art) the scrolls come from an act of meditation. The monk/artist immerses himself in the essence of Spirit, then expresses it visually, to share and inspire a similar experience in the viewer.

Hangings such as these are placed in a contemplative space in the home, to remind and reconnect the viewer to the ever-present inner bliss and beautiful outer manifestations of God.

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I believe deeply that we all deserve to be connected to our joy…whether we call it God, inner peace, or Spirit.

Life challenges us, and we forget about this beautiful essence within. My work, in the spirit of Zenga, is to bring that spiritual experience to people, and to feel it myself as I create my photographic images and the forms they take.

I invite you to the experience of meeting your soul through photography.

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The scroll: I chose three images from my contemplative series, “Sea Dreams,” printed them on archival velvet-style paper, and designed a hand-stitched silk Jacquard scroll wall hanging to complement their peaceful presence. While the front of the scroll highlights the images, the back also radiates it own beauty with hand-stitching, a subtle golden Japanese leaf print on green silk, and a small signed contemplative seaside image gracing the top.

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The Peter T. Brown Gallery, located in the Anderson-Clarke Center at Rice University, is open Monday – Friday, 8:30 AM – 5:00 PM, Thursdays until 8:00 PM. Enter Entrance #8, at University Boulevard and Stockton Drive. The Anderson-Clarke Center will be on your left. There is free 15-minute parking behind the building.

More about the Peter T. Brown Gallery & the Glasscock School of Continuing Education, Rice University

More contemplative images from Heidi Straube

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January 25, 2015

“Blizzard”

I miss the snow this year,
my second winter on Cape Cod.

I miss the drama, the storm,
the pure Immersion in cold and wind
snowflakes on my face.

The silence and softness surround me

Enchanted

In love with capturing God in a blizzard.

*****

Image: “Blizzard”
From Winter: Cape Cod, “Capturing God”
© 2014, Heidi Straube
First Encounter Beach, Eastham, MA, Cape Cod

Photographer’s Note:

I love the softness of this image, the sensuousness of the drifts, the stillness.
It feels like a dream – which it was.

It gives me great pleasure to explore, experience, feel –
To shoot in situations that aren’t traditionally thought of as ideal times.

The dark, the middle of a blizzard, the rain.

Never being sure of the outcome, trusting the Connection is true
This, for me, an essential of being passionate and alive.

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December 7, 2014

“Try to Say” (Rilke)

“As if no one had ever tried before,
try to say what you see and feel and love and lose.

– Rainer Maria Rilke

Image: “Daybreak: Alive”
From the Cape & Islands Collection, “Capturing God”
© 2014, Heidi Straube
First Encounter Beach, Eastham, MA, Cape Cod

Photographer’s Note:

So early in the morning this was taken – when all were sleeping and the sun barely rising. I loved the quiet, the smell of salt air – water lapping softly, expansive sky. I saw and felt the roughness of the dunes, the trees that have weathered all.

How does one “try to say” – capture in an image – the wonder of being alive, immersed in beauty – Waking each day to deep feeling, vulnerability, love?

This is my offering. This is a start.

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Live/Learn:

Through The Personal Odyssey – Intensive, deepen your inner creative connection, feel the sacredness of your photography practice, and find your unique voice and way to express it.

You may also use the Inner Path Photography process to change the way you love and live.

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December 1, 2014

“Sailing the Unknown”

One doesn’t discover new lands

without consenting to lose sight of the shore

for a very long time.

– Andre Gide

When our spirits first imagine them, the lure of new experiences, grand adventures, and making amazing life changes can be very compelling. Seduced and enthusiastic, we decide to take the journey.

Some of us research, plan, set the course. Others leap into the experience and create direction as events unfold.

Either way there is often the illusion that we can always come back to the familiar, the place from where we left.

But true sailing the Unknown has no guarantees. There are highs. There are lows. The winds come up and blow us to places that aren’t on the charts, and we have to correct direction, or choose a new destination – sometimes temporary, other times permanent.

Even if we return to from where we left, we are changed. We have had to draw on courage, trust. We have had to conquer fears we didn’t even know existed before we took the voyage.

Surrendering to the experience, we expand, we flex, we deepen. We become different inside, even if those who we return to see us as the same. The new people we meet on the way are unaware they are seeing a changed person, even from a month before. We are living life from a new place.

When we sail well, we allow life to pierce us, caress us, challenge, uplift us. Throughout, we retain our hearts, our core beings. We nurture and grow the beauty of our souls. And we allow our inner beauty to shine through our actions, thankful to be in this world and on this journey.

To those who find themselves in the Unknown, discovering new lands, whether by choice or circumstance:

I wish you courage, compassion, strength and love.

If you are unable to see the shore – if you feel discouragement, fear, or aloneness –

I wish you the qualities of trust, relaxation, and peace. Yours is a deep and brave quest.

May you find your inner stillness that comes with the beauty of the sail.

Heidi

If you need some nurturing today, perhaps you’ll find grace in my reading of my photo-poem, “Surrender.” The poem and photograph, with the audio link at the end, can be found here.
Other photo poems and mini-meditations can be found here on this blog.

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Category: Photography and spirituality