Time Journeys

Stanley D. Brunn, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus, Department of Geography, University of Kentucky, Lexington,is writing his seventh mega  book with Springer publishing company, TIME JOURNEYS. He has asked me to write a chapter for it. I’ve been working on From Inner Realms to Outer Worlds; an Artist’s Time Journey this summer. This is a good challenge for me, as it was a few years ago when he asked me to write a chapter, Art as a Language: An Atlas of Seasons Where Time and Space Intersect for his Handbook of the Changing World Language Map.

About TIME JOURNEYS, Stan said: “As I define the topic it relates to paths, journeys, trips and progress (and, yes, regressive) efforts over time and space.  It is more than a historical trail or road or a transportation network but also on-going and sustained efforts from one place/location to another and also one time period to another.  There are many kinds of journeys that exist today, some personal, some group, some local and some global.  What I am seeking are creative and innovative ways to define, measure and map those journeys in different contexts.”

Abstract for From Inner Realms to Outer Worlds; an Artist’s Time Journey

“Kathleen O’Brien began her journey as a professional artist in 1968 when she sold her first oil painting, “Beethoven”. Much lead up to that moment. Follow her story as she writes about the routes that lead her from Japan, Italy, Germany and many parts coast to coast of America. Learn about navigating the choices she made about styles, mediums and process as she adapted to the changes in the art world. In this chapter she reveals how her persistence and consistency of mission as an artist sustained her in the journey to the present. This is a story of mapping the inner world in the pursuit of self-knowledge through art making and journaling. By integrating her experiences of a life time, she shares with the world the importance of communication, creativity and contemplation.”

I am on the third draft of the 6000 word chapter. The challenge is to make it interesting and not resume-like. The deadline is this autumn, with a publishing date in late Spring 2023. So there is time to polish it up. Stan wanted about six images to illustrate the text. Is that a joke, to compress fifty four years down to six pictures? One morning I awoke with the idea to put together grids of artwork details chronologically by decades, magic squares of 25! That work-around pleased my inner muse. I share that with you now, and will report back later.

Magic Squares of Fifty Four Years of Art

Fig. 1 details of artwork from 1968-1977, left-right, top-bottom: James H. O’Brien painting me, Beethoven, first art display, Bones, Chopin, Maria, Boulder Arts and Craft CO-OP logo, Spheres, Dream of Grandpa, Talisman for Art, magnifying lens with case, Wave, Jung, feather mandala, spiral chart, Jupiter and Saturn, Head Study, You Don’t Know What You’re Missing, Herons in Indiana Gulch, Seascape, Spirit Boat, Audrey’s Baby Book, Road West, Shells, Water Figure

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Fig. 2 details of artwork from 1978-1987, left-right, top-bottom: Cavalier, Arch, Colette, Looking Back, Basil’s Baby Book, Bird Taking Off, Waves Flying Clouds, Basil, Parrot, Grandpa, Ocean, Karsavina as Firebird, Duck Stamp Swans, Pavlova, Lovebirds, A Swim in the Sky, Wallace Black Elk, Chaco Canyon, Woman at Otawi Crossing, Storm Comes Too Late for the Anasazi, Kiva, Mozart Wearing the Order of the Golden Spur, Transformational Healing Institute logo, Highway, Mozart.

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Fig. 3 details of artwork from 1988-1997, left-right, top-bottom: Grand Gulch Petroglyphs, N.C.A.R., Buffalo Transmitting Power to Man, Gaia, Bridge, Fahada Butte, Kiva, Niwot-Turn of Events, Earth Mother, Sunset Rattle, Ajax-Traveling Shrine, Eagle Feather, East Sky, South Sky, West Sky, Newgrange Vision, Pathway Vision, Pyramids-Serpent Mound-Angel Vision, Dad’s Flag, Brian Boru, Imbolc, Pan, Keening, New O’Brien Shield, Tree in the Center of Ireland.

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Fig. 4 details of artwork from 1998-2007, left-right, top-bottom: Cosmic Nest-Fire, Earth Spirit, Grass is Greener, Lovebirds, Path Revealed, House plan, Grail, Healing Pool, Favorite Climber, Summer Energy, Talisman for Children, Book of Light page 24, Daily Fig, Mozart Requiem -Sanctus, Larkspur Song 3, Postscript 1, Nine White Flowers, Four Seasons – Four Directions invitation, Best of Luck, Everything Moves in Circles and Everything Tries to be Round, Home of the Ancestors shrine, Each Day in the Year of the Firedog, Calliope Hummingbirds, Treasured Map, Dimensions 2.

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Fig. 5 details of artwork from 2008-2017, left-right, top-bottom: Nine Bird Eggs, Abraham Lincoln’s Kentucky, Robin Song, Memories of Summer, Always Merry and Bright, Blackbird Fly, I’ll Miss you Little Wren, Garden for Bluebirds, Gladiola Garden, Garden of Healing – Garden of Hope, Three Worlds, Light of the Earth, Dawn Space, Song for Superb Parrot, Nesting, Realm of Water, At First I Thought It Was the Earth – Now I Know It Is the Universe, Song for Rainbow Parrot, Talisman for Bluebirds, Let Us Do Our Best Even If It Gets Us Nowhere, Talisman for Happiness, Mound Map, Fifty Botanicals, New Brush – Wood Thrush, Atlas of the Year 1.

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Fig. 6 details of artwork from 2018-2022, left-right, top-bottom: Birthday Party With Red-winged Blackbird Symphony and Robin Song, Healing Necklace 13, Anasazi Doorway, Maps book cover Atlas of the Year, Last Peach Iris, Sunwise Mockingbird, Sunwise Oriole, Sunwise Dove, Dear Barn Swallow, Dear Azur Tit, Little Love Letter 1,  Love Letter to Henry Miller 2,   Love Letter to Humanity 9, Madonna Lily 11, Love Letter to M, Little Love Letter 31, Backstories 9, Beginnings-Endings 3, Nesting artist book, October 1-4, State of Grace 1, Swans Dance, Being in the State of Grace, Swans artist book, Being in the State of Grace.

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Fig. 7 details of self-portraits from 1968-2019, left-right, top-bottom: 1968, 1970, 1999, 1968, 1975, 1977, 1979, 1987, 1987, 1991, 1987, 1988, 1989, 1992, 1997, 2019