in sickness and in health

It seems strange not to mention, even though this isn't a diary, per se, that my whole family has been under the massive fist of a monster respiratory flu. Gone are the days of sicknesses that were secretly welcome in their cycle of enforced retreat and return to health-- the ones that I could count as sabbath, cessation, reboot. Well-- maybe I speak too soon, since my chest still feels bruised from coughing and my womb feels like it might spring a leak, letting one of these especially kicky little feet emerge far ahead of schedule. But it's also the incredible craziness of taking care of sick little kids while you can just barely take care of yourself that really makes times like these rough. Tell me it all comes out in the wash as character and gritty love. I'll believe you, especially as a balm to my current weariness. Did I mention I'm 7 months pregnant? Sigh for me while I throw an arm over my forehead.

Alright, so, before this all hit I was so so pleased to finally see "Garden and Cosmos" at the Seattle Asian Art Museum. I knew it was an in-person show, and that fact was proven by the catalog that was placed at the end of the exhibit, which, seen out of that context, would have seemed like a garden indeed. But after seeing the creamy smooth gouache and hair-width delicate lines and fields of gold and silver leaf over which floated, walked and swam endless Indian profiles and flora and fauna of every sort.... well... a printed book just doesn't compare. I've been an admirer, though not especially well-informed, of Indian painting, but I think this may be my first interaction with work of this caliber in person--certainly in this volume. I woke up in the middle of the night seeing seas of faces in profile with "further eyes" (a term I just learned, and believe I'm using correctly, for unforeshortened eyes in Indian painting).

Because of my continued fascination with the ways that we try to picture the unseen, or map things that are elusive, this is the part of the exhibition that was especially engaging for me (text taken from SAM's site):

Man Singh commissioned more than 1,000 paintings expressing the sacred power of the Nath mahasiddhas and their metaphysics. Garden and Cosmos includes about two dozen of these spectacular paintings, which present intense, almost hallucinatory images of enormous conceptual sophistication [...] Monumental paintings in this section of the exhibition represent profound subjects with visionary intensity. Large fields of gold map the cosmos and its emergence from the formless void in some works, while others incorporate intricately realized bodies and cosmic landscapes with shimmering silver rivers.