Title: “ Inner Waqanki”
Oil on Canvas
140 x 80 cm
2024
Serie: “Encounters with divinity and it’s proportion”
My inner Waqanki : A work in the honor of my mother
In January 2024 I went to the Botanical garden in Jena to be called by my next painting, to feel the thread of my intuition leaving it to guide my look, and to be found by the next “Form of the Centre in Nature”. Even though the art subjects are already in me somehow, it’s important to tune in with the Inner self-Present and grab the signals of my labyrinthic creative life.
On that sunny winter day, I took numerous photographs of different Center Forms in plants. Botanical gardens worldwide serve as a vast source of inspiration for me, and I spent the entire day there, which ended at 4 pm, when the sun went down.
Upon returning home, I immediately began an aquarelle sketch of an orchid, Masdevallia Veitchiana, from Machu Picchu. At a glance, I selected this particular orchid because it had three petals, a Vesica Piscis form, and most importantly, its yellow-orange gradient colors, which were particularly my mother’s favorite colors in flowers. The sketch was created with two perspectives of the orchid, a close-up view of the center, which features a spiral, and a second view submerged or floating in water.
A period of introspection, writing, reading, and drawing ensued, in accordance with the dictates of the winter season. The week of the spring Equinox arrived and coincidentally marked the same week my mother passed away a year ago, wich in an act of seeding with her spiritually, I planted 6 different flowers in my terrace and began the Masdevallia Veitchiana painting, as a ritual to sow and bloom, to transform: death in life, the pain in love, and to understand the life and death cycle.
Throughout the painting process, I uncovered various symbolic meanings for the orchid, the form that I selected to portray it, and the center that my hand chose to draw and highlight.
Firstly, the name of the orchid in the Inca culture of Peru is Waqanki, which in Quechua means "you will cry." It blooms between 2,000 and 4,000 meters above sea level. According to an Inca myth, an Inca princess lost someone she loved deeply and from her tears bloomed the Waqanki orchids on the way to Machu Picchu. I was astonished to discover that I had selected the Waqanki without being aware of this symbolic fact. This experience served to reinforce the notion that images and intuition play a pivotal role in my creative process, often leading to decisions that transcend initial awareness. In this instance, the Waqanki myth became a personal myth, a concept that resonates with me every day.
