I have a gift that I discovered in my twenties. I could read art and know how the people who made it felt when they made their art. This gift has developed a great deal since I started working with people to lessen their suffering, using art-making in the process. Today much more information comes to me through people’s art. And more still comes through my own art-work, done in people’s presence, or when I am aware of them.
I used to be a graphic designer and an illustrator. I wrote for children and a little bit for adults. I came to NYC in 1985, 40 years old, married with three children and started a new career as an illustrator only. A few years later I became involved with Chan Meditation Center and studied meditation and Buddhist knowledge with the late Master Sheng-yen from Taiwan. For twelve years I was in a process of deepening my meditation. I had many more experiences and insights and my life changed. After having illustrated more than 40 children’s books and writing two of them, I left this career too and went to NYU to study art therapy.
ByGiora Carmi
It is a day of pain, and I can’t but draw it again and again. A series of three is made and I have them here for you, with the going-in-with-words. Pain Cry out my boy Cry out Dark and sharp is the world for you these days Shout that it hurts…
ByGiora Carmi
I am taking the car to the repair shop. I wait for the mechanics to finish, sitting in a café nearby. I have my paints with me. This is what comes out: And the words follow quite easily: Open the sky, my friend Do you see the burning earth energy As it…
ByGiora Carmi
Another 4 in the morning. It is a harder night for me and I have already woken up many times. I just feel like doing a drawing. This time I use the watercolors. It goes pretty fast till I get the feeling that I have to stop. I collect some words and go back to…
ByGiora Carmi
It is 4 o’clock in the morning, dark all around and I have been awake for a while by the pain. I feel the need to draw. I go to my table and turn on the light. The markers and pencils are there. Sometimes I prefer to use markers to draw the pain as they…
ByGiora Carmi
I felt the need to draw in the morning. I still need to do it most mornings to see where I am. This is what I drew. And this is what came from Going-in-with-words. Baby, Keep the world in you Even if you are falling, falling The world is playful Even with all…
ByGiora Carmi
Time passes. It doesn’t really, but we say so. I still had to work on my guilt and fear. But again pain got hold of me, as you saw in the last entries. At night, I imagined doing a drawing of my guilt. It was like a big, dark cocoon, flying diagonally in the middle…
ByGiora Carmi
It is 4 in the morning. I have not slept for hours due to the pain. It is pretty strong this night. I take the little hand-held and turn it on. The little screen almost blinds me. Trembling with pain I draw. My stylus slips and catches the yellow color. A short yellow line is…
ByGiora Carmi
When I looked at the pictures of the last posting, there was an advice stated in them. It is the clear direction that showed itself more and more clearly, as I moved from drawing one to drawing three. It is: To do what it is for me to do in this life, in spite of…
ByGiora Carmi
This is going to be a long posting, with three pictures. It is all one process, and I want it to be together. I got up in the morning, opened the blog and felt: Oh dear! What did I do yesterday? And a wave of deep shame came over me. I could do it…
ByGiora Carmi
I am starting the process of accepting everything, beginning with shame, guilt and fear about sex. This day I have a lot of pain in my foot. It has not stopped throughout the night and all the hours of this morning. The pain is so strong that all my body shakes from it. I will…
ByGiora Carmi
The deer On the snow covered Mountains Knows That autumn is near From the echo Of his Own voice. This is the picture for this post. It is a free translation from Hebrew of a haiku by Leah Goldberg, an Israeli poet. She is not alive any more. I just remembered it. I felt like…
ByGiora Carmi
Obviously, I do much more than what appears in the blog. It is impossible to include everything that I do for my evolution and healing. You saw how much could be written about only three drawings, coming to investigate what is found in an empty space. And I could even go on. So now there…
