TAKE TIME TO HEAL

If you haven’t noticed, I’ve taken a step back from not just social media but from pretty much everything. Its been a few years now that I spent much of my time travelling and in all honesty, rehabilitating from a terrible accident. Its an artist’s worst nightmare to have your hand broken, bones crushed and body completely sidelined at the brink of a few performances and a twenty painting exhibition.TRUTH: I WAS DEVASTATED. Its a funny thing that social media consists of highlight rolls when its in the lowlights that real growth occurs!

I mean, I virtually lost it all and with the injuries sustained I just had the most gruelling year yet. I mean I really had to relinquish any story of control. If you’re anything like me, its not the easiest thing.

I had to let go of all my great plans and deals and commissions and performances and pretty much the grand plan I had made for myself. You know what they say, make plans and someone is laughing upstairs.

It wasn’t until early summer that I finally returned to Canada. I wasn’t quite ready to do all that much except learn new ways of thinking, seeing and being. Is this even possible?? It was no simple task as I raced up and down the walls of my mind. This ego yelling, “hurry up and heal”! Yeah, ok.

Anything I even remotely began to plan again was abruptly shot to hell. man, was it frustrating. here i’m just dying to do what I love, yet it had become of necessity to really just STOP. i’ve never done that so well, but alas, I surrendered.

It was in that moment, those tears and rage that I began to feel different. that anxiety, those nightmares and the long list of expectations I had placed upon myself, just dissipated. now it seems when I feel anxiety trying to creep in, all the breath work I had been failing to harness, finally found its place.

The doctor calls it pacing, but i’m a wild horse running in an open field. do I even know how to pace? well, i’m learning.

I guess I have felt a lot of shame and disappointment in myself for all that I never became. I needed to learn what self-compassion, self-love and acceptance were. You get to a point in life and you’re like, holy shit! Where did the time go!

But its all perspective really. my first 49 years of life have been learning. i’m ready to write the next epic chapters.

i’m clear on what I want now and with a little patience and continued self-reflection to make better choices and at a realistic pace so as to not be discouraged and burn out, I mean smell the flowers and chill the fuck out Masik!

Most of my life it was all about this art machine I fed, until I noticed after over twenty years,

I was actually starving myself. With these realizations, I have one big thing to share that I hope you can take away from this sharing..create your life, not a living. Cherish the moments you share with the ones you love and spend time with people who inspire you to be a better version of yourself. and mostly, follow you heart. it is the only way to truly live.

That’s all for now.. more to share later.

Six Weeks in Mexico City

if you’re reading this, you may be recently introduced to my work and if you attended the opening of the Group Show in Mexico City, there may be a little confusion with where i’m at now versus where i’ve been. this website currently showcases select collections from what may seems a different artist. Well, its true. i’ve never been a believer in painting the same fucking thing for a lifetime and my collections seem to connect one into the next , with blurred lines and abrupt stops and starts. Life has been like this for me for a few years now as i dismantled this shell of a person (and artist) that was influenced by people who thought they ought to have a say in what I create and why.

Then i woke up from that nightmare.

Took a while to find myself again and currently I am on this journey that entails a lot of undoing. how I think, how i create, shifting focus on rediscovery and realigning my practice with my values. Refining who i am after so many years has become an exciting adventure into unknown territory, countries, cities and my surroundings, as to resist the temptation to settle in familiarity because growth happens in the discomfort, the one that exists at the fringe of all i’ve ever known.

It’s a rather brave act to follow ones heart, to take a path less travelled, to seek out and create the life you want. it was time for a big change and time does not wait for your decision. its up to you to decide and then take action toward that thing in which you envision.

So bare with me as i work at launching my new site, new collection and new adventures as i learn the things i am seeking. its a new website that i want to share the journey and i’ve been meaning to get to the blog before my first six weeks.. and alas here i am! mind you, the six weeks in Mexico city is nearly up. I move on to South America to continue on my quest to learn more about natural pigments and sustainable processes for my practice.

It been an amazing beginning and so far, i have affirmed this decision to being one of the most life altering pivots of my life and career. because hey, life is short, and well there is no time like the present to surrender to your heart’s calling.. and mine has compelled me to leave Canada and head south to learn these things and let life unfold just as it is meant to. now i trust and know in my heart i am where i need to be. right here, right now.

Its been a minute..

I guess it’s been a minute.. it’s like I’ve been hanging out in this cocoon..I been so inward, digging deep into my problems, my challenges, my pain..

cuz I been tired of searching for this face before this world was made..

But the world I made.

The same in which, I destroy.

A kind of slow decay,

a death,

a rebirth.

Still in the cocoon..

getting closer

ready

to fly.

I awoke on the operating table

I awoke on the operating table

(insert Baseltz painting of cumptural heads peering down upon you and the casket in which you lay.. oh I mean, operating table). 

fucking Jesus mothering, fucking son of a Donkey Kong.

I never was really into

U liked to Pac the Men

outside of the suitcase

that you also left in your wake

(that wild child, the locker and key, the artist, a dreamer, closet prodigy, distant rival, beloved betrayer, reminder and remainder of tragic nostalgias, confounded, compounded, extracted, retracted..

now once again, distracted)..

i am thinking the same as you..

WHAT THE FUUCk.

~profound sound. 

something written in room 7300 floor 7A in the hospital bed upon which I did lay but when I close my eyes, it’s the blue framed windshield and the wrapped chrome plate that smacked me to take such height in my flight then crashed smacked down on the concete then rolled twice round kissing booths sides of my face, folding down my sides holding at my hips. Off my bike that was some fucking hit. And judging by the beginnings of some poem - I guess— those were some fucking meds.

im alive oh I’m alive🙏

I wish I was Charles Bukowski

I wish I was Charles Bukowski.

This latter name, or bitter end, a name known before I even knew how to read. Or perhaps I did in  another life.

Times blur is but illusions rolling mist. Clouds the eyes.

But he,

This one,

He’s different.

(Oh how many times, these words,

Writ I, upon the page🙄?)

He uses words like ‘cunt’.

Not a big fan of it,

But mine hears her name called out.

Then his blunt knife, a blade sharp in verse.

Deliberate after such descriptive blabberings.

That wrap your entire body in a knot.

The kind that doesn’t come undone,

Yet you have.

The taste lingers,

But oh how sweet.

(A giggle.)

(A knowing smile.)

My favourite —right now anyway—-

‘Love is a dog from hell’

Charles Bukowski

poems from 1974-77

Especially Chapter 3.

-I am Scarlet. ‘get it on over’.

-Red Up and down so beautifully written she stands before you.

And like a flower in the rain-?

You become.

Huge ear rings- have you ever tried laying down like this?

And OF COURSE,

A Killer.

‘Nuff said.

I wish I was Charles Bukowski.

How can a poetry written over forty years ago  be so refreshing ?

Live your truth.

Write your truth.

He’s brilliant just for being.

What is your brilliance in being?

Sometimes I’m scared to paint like that. Even write like that.. but then you read something from Charles and life seems pretty ok. Even funny. Just be who you be. He had a great way of sharing it with the world.

Reading poetry  Inspires me. I have books of poetry floating throughout every space I occupy.

Thank you Charles.

So thats how I get inspired to write..

and with you,

Share this..

You’re a good chew.

You know when you know. 

Private and Corporate Acquisitions

 https://www.ifuckingloveyou.ca/masik-collection

Password access upon request.

pamela@masikism.com

This link features some of the seven distinct collections from Masik’s twenty-year Retrospective, currently on exhibition in the artists 8,700 square-foot studio located in the  Olympic Village, Vancouver. By appointment only.

To book your tour:

info.masik@gmail.com

Simple Reminders

 Where I create,

there I am true. 

 #Rilke 

You’re invited!! A Twenty-year Retrospective, ‘I Fucking Love You’ January 31 ..here’s how you get in the door!! Rsvp duh..

In the MIND of an Artist

Inside Masik Studios...on the eve of a twenty-year Retrospective.. JANUARY 31st!! Ahhhh!  Excited and nervous at once!! 

FIND MUCK.

Fuck.I want to rite you.

Rite. I want to fuck you.

what I want.

Sometimes I fail,

for I lay between the lines,

only I choose to read.

The truth is I just want you closer to me.

( it will likely never be unless you were an elixir I can drink to satiate my undying thirst, and unrelenting hunger pangs.. I have for you). 

Dear Diary

Dear Diary, 

i must apologize my Dear, it isn’t you- it’s me. My distance has been no other than a result of the others I too keep. I only found you now in much more convenient of ways, that I shall endeavour to give you more of my precious time and words. I promise, I do.  

Love, Pamela xo

When pain exceeds pleasure, it's time for change.

there is a time in ones life where pain exceeds pleasure and the mere longing for change, becomes a necessity. However, despite this perceived essential act of change, there most often are a myriad of reasons to deter ones first step (or second if you include this realization), to move toward the desired outcome or rather the possibility of anything other than the current situation.

Forget all the achievements and growth others may remind, for gratitude has been a daily meditation kept in mind.  Yet I do not see what others may, for blinding illusions fall prey to all those who belong to another place and time. Is not success differentiated from eye to eye? What a life made they say, yet somehow all that remains is but a betrayal of this dream; not everything is as it may seem. 

in this place I have myself found, I have pondered and dug a many quarry, that too remain, as evidence of such, that to face could not conjure all that I needed to say, but with time, these quarries now revealed through my bleeding fingers and broken brush. 

What say I and in such preposterous ways!  With flowers for heads and petals of hearts jarred, held by the fading warrior with the King on his lap and raised above his crown, the bird talons grasping around what appears to be our planet earth. But the mask of the warrior, now worn by a fish, swimming toward the figure reclined, yet deliberately with foot upon chest of another, the fight for status and oppression of the same kind (yes this really does happen when we should support and be kind)..anyway this story continues to unfold, just like all of the rest, of these paintings I suppose that have led me to an imminent change...I mean something BIG.

I feel it coming and have my own design in mind, however not all is clear but I trust and will know as to myself revealed, one day at a time.  For now I let go of all that I condemned and in these quarries remain the stories perhaps upon viewing, you too shall relate. In these last strokes, after months and years, I once again find pleasure in rediscovering what they say-- oh how this has become somewhat a game! For the answers are there and in my final days before leaving again, laugh as I discover all the questions asked --and sometimes begged, through treacherous years  I now know, were never lived in vain. Now I am ready, ready for change.

In the early stages... this is 'Wallflower'  maybe 6 x 7'?? stay tuned for final pics

Upon Refection...

It is so interesting to reflect upon journal entries from years gone by, to rediscover that which one values and perhaps has lost sight of. Perspective is everything..maybe timing is too. This journal entry was written while I was in the hospital and immobilized on the eve of a new year and also a new collection. Which one? The Forgotten Project. In January 2006, with cast still on, I remember wobbling around the studio (despite doctor's orders), and beginning the first six of sixty-nine 8'x10' portraits of the missing and murdered women from the downtown Eastside of Vancouver- an area covering a six block radius just east of the financial district. Known as the  'poorest postal code', the DTES, comprised of a marginalized community that was (and perhaps still is), largely viewed as inconsequential and disposable over the course of time when women would disappear and authorities continued to ignore the issue.

Well, I can continue down this road and share with you in detail, the atrocity in which I believe we as a society were ultimately the cause of, however, this post is more about having the courage and desire to say something about it, confronting society with our role in the tragedy. Having found the courage to do so wasn't easy. At the time I began sharing this idea, discussing the project with my mentor, friends, collectors and public figures, I was generally told that in doing so, creating this collection, I would hurt my reputation. Well, that was 2006--its now 2017--and I can say most people were correct, but at the onset and throughout the creation of this collection, I held steadfast to my reasons for doing so, and ultimately broke down over the five year period with the final scene, the crescendo, being my first major museum show censored and finally cancelled. There was deliberate bullying and threats, conferences and speaking opportunities overturned, to a point I required a security guard AND my son- on the advice of the police, was to stay away from the studio.In addition, the program I had started at a shelter in the area, removed my name from it and changed the course title, as women in the program were given a message to me that if I was to venture in the area that I would get beat up.  It was a very stressful time, my heart ached, I was shamed and eventually, I crashed and burned.  

BUT this journal entry in particular, was so pure of heart and very much naive to all of what I experienced. These were my thoughts and words that describe a very courageous time and I guess the reason I am sharing it is because of the last two entries and what I currently seek. I realized I have once known what it is to love oneself and it is something I endeavour to find once again. There is hope! 

And she writes:

JOURNAL:

  :: 12.31.2005 ::

    It is of a timely manner to walk a thousand steps until one cannot walk any further. As I lay in bed in the eve of a new year, I truly am immobilized to some extend, for a good six weeks. I have been on these feet so many hours that I am afraid my last trip to Europe has caused me to walk until I could no longer do so without pain. Somehow the physical manifestation that tells me' slow down' is just what I need to digest what I have learned in a year. 

..to finally realize a vision of painting so freely before an expansive canvas without a glimpse of fear, to have the courage to find one's voice in private and prepare it to share with the world...to affect change in another. To realize what is important to me and what fades to grey and how deep an ocean of possibilities can be. It is in choosing to dive, in choosing to try, to expand and realize that all you ever wanted is yours for the wanting. That self-worth is as necessary as self-esteem. That trusting oneself leads to an ability to trust another and no advice is better than your own, for it is your life and somehow you are involved in that creation. That accepting things you cannot change as they are and having the courage to change what you can. To forgive and to love..yourself.

..and life, with all of its pain and suffering guides us to a way through. It is through love.

View fullsize

Masik revealing two of the sixty-nine 8'x10' paintings from 'The Forgotten' collection 2006-10

When my heart cannot deny your song..

It started with a sound that struck the chords of my heartstrings, the dusty tattered ones that resonated well with the alluring echoes of every beat within the chamber walls. It wasn’t a skip or a long awkward pause, it was the well of tears and the aching of scars that bound my heart like a protective shell. Perhaps these scars with sound realizedthat moment is near and it would shed themselves enough for love to be once again felt. But whoa the aching that merely days later, still reminds that even the funny ones and touching moments seem exaggerated in their kind, so again I unwind and now rewind the ravelling pieces. Oh God where does it end and I begin?

It seems but a new part of myself that makes it harder to jump, harder to trust, and to feel anything too much. Ive lived so long in that place, the hearts dwelling but after the last two or four or seven( years or attempts), I don’t know if it is even possible to happen to me again. For how can it, if I simply do not allow such measures to realize, that which I secretly long for. 

I guess with these words written it isn’t such a secret any longer. Even from myself.

I guess with these words written, and with you, the reader, my witness, I acknowledge the direction in which I want to go and it is in my hopes that from this place, I will figure out just how to do so. 

For now, all I know is, 

When my heart cannot deny your song, 

And in reminder aches, 

Tells me that I yearn to learn, 

Just how to love once again.