the beauty of destruction

Being faced with inevitable destruction is a painful and fantastic experience. Confronted with the pain of loss, I think we often find ourselves brooding over what has been taken from us. We feel entitled to the things we have grown accustomed to, especially the things our hands have helped to create. When things, people, and places are taken from us, a void grows. It calls to mind the Taoist teachings of the "fertile void" (the creativity of the self in which all exists in a ceaseless motion of formless form) (Lao Tzu). Of course this void gives way to growth. It is redemption, in Christianity, death giving life. Jesus tells us to die to our selves that we might live. Loss breeds a kind of selflessness. It reminds us that we too are temporary as we exist here on this earth, and that time is a constant flux of death and rebirth. It is humbling, and empowering.

A few days ago, the cat i am fostering for some friends destroyed a piece of my art that was very important to me. More than that, Kali Ma is the goddess of destruction. I learned so much from creating this specific piece of art. I felt steeped in death as I was making it, calling to mind the losses I have experienced, global loss, and my own fears concerning mortality. Throughout the work, my attitude toward destruction continued to change and grow. I wanted my Kali to represent all of this. I wanted to evoke the fear and awe of the forces of destruction and death. Insomuch as Kali is death, she is life. She perplexed me, fascinated me, hypnotized me, and taught me. The moment I felt it was finished, I had a sort of mini satorsis, the kind of transcendence I continue to hope my work will bring forth. It was beautiful.

I am glad for those of you who got the opportunity to see Kali before curiosity took its toll. I relish in the irony and the story of her death. After thinking about it for a few days, I see already how the creation of this particular work of art prepared me to lose it. And that is beautiful, like natural disaster, or like nuclear bombs. I don't claim to understand anything about what happened, but I am beginning to feel a certain kind of freedom as a direct result of this loss. Its hard to explain. But letting go, accepting, and finding pleasure and beauty in the ephemeral only drives me toward what I believe to be the eternal. I'm not sure what that is. But I can feel it here, among the ruins of Kali.