Fleeting and enchanting, here now but soon to be gone: Ephemera. Not sure what it is about paper creations, but they capture my heart. Take me to an art walk and I will stop in my tracks entranced by hundreds of paper doves hanging from the ceiling in a tiny studio. Recently I opened a used book and out fell an old map and a photograph. More ephemera! At a recent visit to a historic home I saw aged bookshelves filled with dusty volumes and all sorts of unformed, ephemeral thoughts swirled through my mind: all the minutes, hours, years spent creating unread and disintegrating books, all the aching hands that folded the dangling paper birds, all the people in the photographs long gone from this life.
The dictionary defines ephemera as things useful or important only for a brief time. Tickets, maps, brochures...all the things we used to paste into memory albums, now yellowed and curled. They speak of the fleeting nature of life and yet, paradoxically, the endurance of Being.
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The Apostle Paul wrote in the book of 1 Corinthians that "all things will pass away" except for faith, hope, and love. You can see what remains and endures: the love, kindness, and goodness that pass down through to future generations. This is also what art does, whether it's writing, music, sculpture, or painting (or a host of other creative expressions.) Art captures and preserves, at least for a time, the fleeting thought, the vista, the form, long after the artist is gone. Maybe what fascinates me about all the ephemera is the artist's voice in its essence. While I paint, I'm pouring my attention and intention into the work and trusting the message of goodness and love come through. Using archival and 'best practices' in the studio gives me hope the painting will last much longer than the paper doves.
Thank you for reading my ephemeral words! Stay safe and be mindful of others' safety as well.
