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Description
Pisiskow Acahkwak
animal spirits

I did this series of five paintings with the animal totems that lead us forefront in my mind. Each figure has two totems in their field, the primary one with the single, all-seeing eye, and the secret one that they keep in their hearts, the one that whispers.

This can be interpreted in many different ways, one of which could be seen as the clan totem and the personal totem. Another viewpoint could focus on the animal spirit that guides our life as the larger totem, and the animal spirit that guides our moment as the smaller. Both of these ideas are correct, and in fact, as many more as can be conceived would work. This is the strength and power of symbols: that they can hold as many - and as much - meaning as we can pour into them. A symbol is a vessel that can never be filled, but only grows deeper the more we add meaning to it.

In many ways, then, we can look at our own lives as symbols of something deeper.

As we are all connected, each of these paintings lead into each other until the last, which returns again to the first. Like all symbols, these paintings contain in them more than I could ever say, but in my writings, I'll maybe give us a place to start:

Owl

She sees more than she wants to, this woman who is guided by the owl. She sees through the darkness and is the closest to the world of the spirit. She is also a hunter, but a silent one who comes like a ghost and is away on the sound of the wind. Later when all is silent, she'll call out in a gentle question, or a screech of defiance. The trees are her home, as they reach up to the heavens, but her business is with the small things of this earth, her destiny tied up in the fluttering hearts of her prey. She seems to have a deep compassion, perhaps because she understands that all things must pass, that we all *take* in our lives, and in the end we all must give away. So silent she sits, regarding us with a majesty that is borne of long nights of loneliness.

Description
Pisiskow Acahkwak
animal spirits

I did this series of five paintings with the animal totems that lead us forefront in my mind. Each figure has two totems in their field, the primary one with the single, all-seeing eye, and the secret one that they keep in their hearts, the one that whispers.

This can be interpreted in many different ways, one of which could be seen as the clan totem and the personal totem. Another viewpoint could focus on the animal spirit that guides our life as the larger totem, and the animal spirit that guides our moment as the smaller. Both of these ideas are correct, and in fact, as many more as can be conceived would work. This is the strength and power of symbols: that they can hold as many - and as much - meaning as we can pour into them. A symbol is a vessel that can never be filled, but only grows deeper the more we add meaning to it.

In many ways, then, we can look at our own lives as symbols of something deeper.

As we are all connected, each of these paintings lead into each other until the last, which returns again to the first. Like all symbols, these paintings contain in them more than I could ever say, but in my writings, I'll maybe give us a place to start:

Owl

She sees more than she wants to, this woman who is guided by the owl. She sees through the darkness and is the closest to the world of the spirit. She is also a hunter, but a silent one who comes like a ghost and is away on the sound of the wind. Later when all is silent, she'll call out in a gentle question, or a screech of defiance. The trees are her home, as they reach up to the heavens, but her business is with the small things of this earth, her destiny tied up in the fluttering hearts of her prey. She seems to have a deep compassion, perhaps because she understands that all things must pass, that we all *take* in our lives, and in the end we all must give away. So silent she sits, regarding us with a majesty that is borne of long nights of loneliness.