‘There’s an Essence within you that can neither be enhanced nor diminished. It spans Universes and embraces the minuscule, the infinitesimal.’1

I thought I was in the NSW Southern Highland just to spend three days at a watercolour workshop with Susannah Blaxill. My mother had come along for the ride, enticed by the promise of a warm fire and good company. I had brought watercolour paints, brushes, coloured pencils, sharpeners, erasers, knives, archival paper, and a positive attitude. I had no expectations that I would produce anything. I just wanted to know where to start…. anyway…how hard could it be to paint mushrooms? I had spent three years at art school learning to draw and paint so I wasn’t prepared to let a brown mushroom defeat me.

At the front entrance of the studio, there was a table. It was covered with beautiful botanical subjects; figs, pomegranates, dried seed pods, colourful flowers, twisted branches laden with berries, and many, many mushrooms. Graciously the teacher stood back and allowed each person, in turn, to choose a subject. I chose the hardest thing to paint on the table - a pomegranate.

Susannah wasn’t fazed. She carefully moved among us, helping us start, and instructing us individually in techniques and materials.

Lesson 1:

“What can you see? Can you see red here, and green there? … Look! there is yellow and purple.” We strained to find the colours she pointed out in the leaf or fruit. “This is what makes painting interesting and fun. Find the colours.” “Paint what you see.” Susannah could see way more colours than I could - but perhaps with practice I too could see them, I thought. Her artwork was exquisite - flowers or leaves had been painted with layers of colour, red, orange, yellow, green, and purple, creating so much to delight the eye. Yet it was so subtle, so detailed. On the second day, I realised that this first lesson was really about ‘the art of seeing’; about creating art from a place of wonder and appreciation. We do a lot of looking but we see less and less. This lesson reminded me about taking time to perceive the essence of something.

Lesson 2

“Attention to detail” After the washes of colour Susannah adds the details. “It’s called drybrush work because there’s barely any water. The small 0000 brushes help me explain the detail.” “If you can take something ordinary and create something that stops people in their tracks, that’s the thrill. It gives me real joy,” says Susannah. And this was another transformative lesson. This was tiny work - if I could see my brush strokes I wasn’t doing the technique right. As I tried to replicate her techniques I discovered a new level of detail is possible and dropped into a new depth of seeing I’d never experienced before.

I started to think about the parables of Jesus. Were they not all about taking time to stop and dig deeper within to find a heightened perception of God, the world and our neighbours? ‘Consider the Lilies’ is about living from a new depth of faith. ‘The Parable of the Seed’ is about putting ourselves intentionally in a place where we can grow spiritually. ‘The Parable of the Good Samaritan’ is about recognising a new level of inclusivity. All of Jesus’ lessons were about moving deeper into faith and reaching a new level of perception.

Viewing the world from this sharpened perspective changes you. To see, we must each reach inside to experience something from the highest level of presence. Seeing in this way takes you to a transformative place of wonder - a spiritual dimension we are only just grasping and it has us pause, pray, love, look for the details in life and ask the questions:

Where is the place of wonder in my life?

What happens when I open up to deeper levels of perception?

Where have I left places for the sacred or transcendent in my life?

‘Art is neither profession nor hobby. Art is a Way of Being.’ 2 Whether you have a brush in your hand or not, this story is about reaching for the highest level of presence; about practising the skills of deep listening, empathy, inclusivity and compassion. This story is about discovering Essence.

For Contemplation:

BREATH

This

breathing

in is a miracle,

this breathing out, release,

this breathing in a welcome to

the unseen gifts which sustain me each

moment, this breathing out a sweet sigh,

a bow to my mortality, this breathing in

a holy yes to life, this breathing out

a sacred no to all that causes

me to clench and gasp,

this breathing in is a

revelation, this

breathing out,

freedom. 3

Anne Bonnefin
Communications Coordinator
Community of Christ Australia

Chelan Harkin, There’s an Essence from Let us Dance! The stumble and whirl with the beloved.
Frederick Franck, A Passion for Seeing: On Being an Image Maker
Christine Valters Paintner, Dreaming of Stones