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Sue Ellen Parkinson: Artist Statement
For the last few years I've been painting Christian mystics with the hope of discovering my own relationship to them. To the surprise of many of my secular friends, my walls are now covered with paintings of Saints. The surprise for me has been that in painting these icons, I’ve fallen in love with them and gained a new perspective.
I’m particularly drawn to Mary Magdalene and images of the Sacred Feminine. For me Magdalene has become a symbol of all women who have been misrepresented and denied their appropriate authority in the world. It’s been a healing experience to restore her identity to the wise and sovereign being that I believe she was. In so doing I have become more empowered myself.
I am not a Christian nor a religious scholar yet my connection with these icons feels genuine. Painting them has helped me to find entrance into what I can only call the Divine.
The saints have had millions upon millions of people praying to them. My sense is that those prayers create a kind of current. So, as I paint them I enter into a kind of river of prayer myself. This experience has somehow helped to suspend my own despair about the world. To the degree I can, I hope to share that experience with others through my art.
website: www.sueellenparkinson.com
For the last few years I've been painting Christian mystics with the hope of discovering my own relationship to them. To the surprise of many of my secular friends, my walls are now covered with paintings of Saints. The surprise for me has been that in painting these icons, I’ve fallen in love with them and gained a new perspective.
I’m particularly drawn to Mary Magdalene and images of the Sacred Feminine. For me Magdalene has become a symbol of all women who have been misrepresented and denied their appropriate authority in the world. It’s been a healing experience to restore her identity to the wise and sovereign being that I believe she was. In so doing I have become more empowered myself.
I am not a Christian nor a religious scholar yet my connection with these icons feels genuine. Painting them has helped me to find entrance into what I can only call the Divine.
The saints have had millions upon millions of people praying to them. My sense is that those prayers create a kind of current. So, as I paint them I enter into a kind of river of prayer myself. This experience has somehow helped to suspend my own despair about the world. To the degree I can, I hope to share that experience with others through my art.
website: www.sueellenparkinson.com