Fine art photographer Charlotte Watts recently sent me an exquisite image of a single feather.
"I cannot feel this Barred Owl breast feather in my hand," she wrote. "It is 'nothingness', or perhaps we are, and it is there all the while... being breath exhaled."
I was moved by her tender awareness of the feather. By her attention to what she could see but not feel, and in that state of weightlessness, considering the feather might be more real than we.
I'm thinking about what is possible when we pay attention, and allow ourselves to imagine what is beyond what we know.
I want to create paintings that matter. It starts with noticing what I love. Each creature, each raptor, every landscape and sky and stone has a story to tell. Eventually their stories and mine find common ground.
How this comes about in my painting process is a mystery. I believe it has something to do with discovering more of what I'm feeling, in the unconscious ways the marks and the brushstrokes appear in the paintings.
There is a collective grief today that feels overwhelming to acknowledge.
Charlotte's weightless feather is a reminder of all the good and true around us that we cannot see or feel. Could paying attention, imagining and feeling the 'other' without actually knowing, help us through the darkness and the light?
It brings me hope.
Bethany Rowland
November 2022
A portion of artist proceeds from sales will be donated to The Center for Biological Diversity and Doctors Without Borders
