First published in Emmanuel Elliot’s Reminders of Reality Newsletter and re-published with permission:

I have a memory from when I was very little – maybe just one or two years old – about a dream that came, perhaps several times, and that I have remembered throughout the years, and when I see a little bit of it appearing in my work, a feeling of beauty and gratitude comes with it.

I am floating in a very dark space. The darkness is more profound than the darkness I see with my eyes closed and more profound that the darkness in a room completely sealed from light. More absolute and dimension-full than ordinary dark: a dark filled with a feeling that is indescribable in terms of light. It was a dark of feeling, quietly embracing me in comfort and peace, a quiet of feeling in acceptance.

At some point I began to see tiny points of luminous light floating in the dark. The points were floating to and fro as if moved from within, and trailing little tails of their many colors. Some of them seemed to have more than one color inside. At some point the little lights became brightly colored little light fishes. Paradoxically, the light was the fishes and the fishes were the light.

When I awakened from these dreams, there was an atmosphere of happiness and wonder in the room and in me. Throughout all the years years since then and until now, I still get a sense of that atmosphere. A happiness, gratitude, and contentment when that kind of image appears in my work.

I often make pictures between 10:00 PM and 3:00 AM, when the atmosphere in my studio is something like that in those dreams.

These early experiences, that I now consider “spiritual,” continue to be the foundation of my motivation to go down the stairs to my studio to begin a night’s work. I have been calling it my “work,” but I think calling it my “play” is more accurate.

Here are a couple of my pictures that I think illustrate something of the above.

The first is called World Peace.
https://weebly.us6.list-manage.com/track/click?u=cf9b204ee82546a20a15acdb4&id=0636225c52&e=bfbd151d20

The animation was made from one of my layered Photoshop images.
It was made with my direction by my Subud friend Matthias Dussan, also a member of our San Joaquin Valley group.

When viewing my World Peace animation, I suggest that you do it first with the sound turned all the way down, and then with the music at low volume.

The second is called Night Vision for Peaceful Horizon, which can be seen at https://weebly.us6.list-manage.com/track/click?u=cf9b204ee82546a20a15acdb4&id=17c21d2066&e=bfbd151d20