Kiva Mountain Collection
Live From Crystal Mountains of Western North Carolina
Featuring
Post Ascension Imagery, Shamanic Iconography, Medicine Art Paintings,
The Real, The Surreal, The Plain and The Visionary
What is Post Ascension Imagery?
Surreal and visionary, 'Post Ascension Imagery' refers to art created from a timeline where humanity has transcended its current level of chaos and unrest, and now occupies a realm of existence where sensorial and spiritual awareness have merged, where color is deep and brilliant, where the air is rich with consciousness and sentiency, and humanity is interfused with the Mother Earth in a much more thorough manner than is currently even imagined as possible.
What is Medicine Art?
'In the end, it will be creativity that will heal the world'----Aboriginal Elder, Australia
This quote applies to the genre of 'Medicine Art'. Medicine Art as a term comes from Native America, and emerges from a certain state of consciousness which precedes the artwork's creation. The medicine artist uses creativity as a tool for achieving healing, teaching, sharing spiritual laws or universal principles, catalyzing change or using the image as a certain portal through which the viewer can experience realities not accessible if left to his or her own devices or habitual point of view. Anyone, absolutely anyone, can do medicine art. It is not about talent or trend, society's sanction or one's historical lineage. It is completely based within the heartfelt desire to be of help to others, to a society at large, to animals, plants, the ecological systems of the earth and the multiverse itself.
MEDICINE WAY AND THE POWER OF BEAUTY:
An Essay on Finding Art As A Regular Part of the Day
'In 1911, the Santee Dakota physician and author Oyiyesa said, 'In the life of the Indian, there was only one inevitable duty---the duty of prayer---the daily recognition of the Unseen and the Eternal. Each soul must meet the morning sun, the new sweet Earth, and the Great Silence alone! Whenever, in the course of the daily hunt, one came upon a scene that was strikingly beautiful or sublime...he paused for an instant in an attitude of worship.'
Behind these few words, a great secret is revealed---the secret of personal and planetary renewal. Never has the need for unity with the natural world and reverence for all life been more urgent or personally imperative. To heal our times and our people, we must heed the words of the late Oglala Sioux leader, Chief Luther Standing Bear. He described his people as 'true naturists---who loved the Earth and all things of the Earth. They sat upon the Earth, close to its life-giving forces, to be able to think more deeply, to feel more keenly, to see more clearly into the mysteries of life, and to come closer in kinship to other lives about them...
They were wise.They knew that man's heart away from Nature became hard, and that lack of respect for growing, living things soon led to lack of respect for humans too. So they kept their youth close to its softening influence.'
To recognize the movement of the Great Spirit through us and around us, within the elements and within all creatures, is to reclaim our human birthright and to rediscover the Holy Mystery for ourselves and our children.'
Susanne Still BIO
Aside from her over 40 years in ongoing creative work ranging through clay, paint, photography, mixed media, and interior design, between places such as Florida, California, Maui, and New Mexico, Susanne Still is a medicinal plant enthusiast specializing in native New Mexican plant medicines with her own line of healing products: 'Kiva Mountain Eco-Medicinals'. She is an avid eco and natural health researcher with an especial eye on the earth changes underway and the effects in the global atmosphere from the exponential increase of nuclear pollution and other toxins. For the past seven years she has been actively repurposing a historic New Mexican homestead within the boundaries of the Santa Fe National Forest, where many of the images in this archive are captured. Currently in transition and seeking an acreage within which to found an eco/arts/survival/healing center to further the Earth friendly pathway started in off road Taos, continued in off road Maui, to off road Tesuque, and now exploring the Blue Ridge Mountains of Western North Carolina.
Quoting Susanne: 'All creative work, when sourced from heart, soul and integrity of spirit, leads to one primary end: etheric regeneration and a higher, more clarified and ascended collective human consciousness.'
ABOUT Kiva Mountain Ceramic Design and WORLD PETROGLYPH REPRODUCTIONS
What are petroglyphs?
Literally translated, the word means 'rock writing'. Created by ancient peoples sharing and saluting timeless truths about human life, spiritual forces, and man's place in the universal stream, petroglyphs can be found at sacred sites throughout the world. Seen by many as humanity's first universal 'medicine art' language, these cryptic carvings unite us with a time when man, spirit & nature worked in harmony as one intelligent, compassionate force.
Petroglyphs commemorate births, deaths, ceremonial events and shamanic rites of passage, and are revered by spiritual elders for their 'mana', or living spiritual power.
In the 1990's, these hand made art works were shown through the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, representing the indigenous arts of Hawai'i at an international conference celebrating the 'Year of the Indigenous Peoples'. They have been shown extensively throughout the Hawaiian Islands, including the Polynesian Cultural Center, The Bishop Museum, the Hana, Maui, Cultural Center, The Maui Arts and Cultural Center, Imax Theatres, the Duty Free Shops in Honolulu International Airport, The Elephant Walk in the Hyatt Regency Maui, The Hui Noeau Visual Arts Center, The Hotel Hana gift shop, and Waikiki Trader's Endangered Species stores.
In 2005, a special piece with a Hopi petroglyph entitled 'Bringing the Light' was presented to the former First Lady of Kenya, Mrs. Lucy Kibaki, by the noted late humanitarian Father Angelo D'Agostino, S.J., M.D., as an honorarium for her personal and political support given his Nyumbani Village Project, a medical center, orphanage and hospice eco-village in Kenya.
The works have also found their way into the hands of such celebrities as Whoopi Goldberg, Spike Lee, Woody Harrelson, Yoko Ono, Peter Gabriel, Jean Michael Costeau, Gary Shandling, and 'Sweet Honey' of Sweet Honey and the Rock. Many have been presented as gifts to highly respected medicine healers and tribal elders.
Each piece is hand made in clay and embossed with authentic designs ceremonially reproduced from rock carvings, cave paintings, geoglyphs, and sacred shamanic objects from the world's tribal peoples.
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Susanne Still joined Pixels on May 26th, 2012.
