Kaleidoscope Moon for Children Gone Too Soon Number - 5 Flame and Flower

by Aberjhani

Title

Kaleidoscope Moon for Children Gone Too Soon Number - 5 Flame and Flower

Artist

Aberjhani

Medium

Digital Art - Silk-featherbrush

Description

Kaleidoscope Moon for Children Gone Too Soon Number - 5 Flame and Flower (Silk-Featherbrush Number 19)

THE IMAGE ITSELF
Every now and then I labor on an image that rejects my plans for it and insists I allow it to shape itself. "Flame and Flower" represents one of those instances. The abstract representation of fire moving over flowers piled up in a partial pyramid shape is a visual metaphor for self-defeating divisiveness. It can come in various forms, such as: violent conflict resolution versus nonviolent conflict resolution, love versus hate, or co-existence versus... well, not exactly a whole lot of choices there.

People who don't necessarily subscribe to one concept or the other find themselves caught in the middle of unsettling friction. Like U.S. government employees suffering from the current government shutdown, many children gone before their time were casualties of different kinds of wars, some inside the heads of deranged individuals and some on politically-designed battlefields. In "Kaleidoscope Moon for Children Gone to Soon Number - 5 Flame and Flower." the huge waxing moon looming in the foreground and surrounded by a halo of violet and silver petals could be symbolic of what is called "the harmony of the spheres." Or it may symbolize that possibility of a "unified humanity" so many of history's great thinkers have proposed.

THE STORY BEHIND THE SERIES
During the holiday season some years ago, I lost a niece and nephew to extreme violence and chose to honor their lives by naming a Christmas tree after them. It was my way of gifting them the joy of which they had been robbed. The new Kaleidoscope Moons Series is an extension of that tradition in honor of children lost to such violence around the world as we move forward into 2019. It is also an expression of standing in solidarity with families who have endured these losses as they adjust to something from which they are unlikely to ever fully recover. Therefore, in lieu of a Christmas tree, the Kaleidoscope Moons Series.

Specifically: The news out of Houston, Texas (USA) was particularly gruesome upon learning that 7-year-old Jazmine Barnes had been shot and killed while in a car with her family the morning before New Year's Eve. Her mother, LaPorsha Washington, was also shot but survived along with 3 other daughters. In my hometown of Savannah, Georgia, an up-and-coming 17-year-old rapper named Tyrese Carter and a 20-year-old named Jamar Davis Jr. were shot dead within 24 hours after the New Year got underway.

The family of one gun violence victim, former university student Rebecca Foley killed 6 years ago in Savannah, announced plans to fight back. They are suing, to the tune of $35 million, the owners of the apartment complex where Ms. Foley was killed for the "inadequate security" they feel contributed to her death.

Obviously art cannot bring back any of our loved ones lost to senseless violence. But for those who did not get their chance to establish mega-stardom and document their passage on this journey we call life, the Kaleidoscope Moons Series can testify on their behalf. It can proclaim they were here and their lives were as deserving of celebration and remembrance as anyone's.

Aberjhani
Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance
The River of Winged Dreams

Uploaded

January 17th, 2019

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