The Transforming Breath 2/6 VE

This woodcut is from a Variable Edition of 6 hand-pulled prints.  Each piece in the 6 prints has elements that are different from any of the others hence it is called a variable edition.  In this print the bird/man image is black and one of the 3 feathers is also black making it different from any of the other prints and thus an original piece of art.

The images (face of the bird and the person breathing the feathers) are actually of people I met in Beijing.  In North America I have often been asked if it is an indigenous person and I'm always struck by the similarities between these very different peoples.  It feeds into the philosophy that we are all one and now more than ever, we need to work as one people on the earth.  While this series is an homage to the beliefs of different cultures it is also to some extent an homage to the practice of yoga.  In yoga, breath is the life force and mindfulness, control of breath (pranayama), can lead to better understanding of the nature of the mind, better health, stress management, calmness and muscle relaxation in other words, transformation of the body.

I often use feathers in my work and in this case I have used red to represent strength and passion and black to represent the need to be aware of surroundings, be wary.