Columnist Dan Abernathy.

Courtesy photo

I’ve often been asked where the sources of chronologies, excerpts, fragments, reflections and words from the artistic journals of Dan Abernathy derive from. The answer, formulated from my own bewilderment, is that the contents I share come from a type of entanglement with words that are spoken, read or written. They are a derivative of my thoughts, prayers and meditations that have no parameters on a freethinking mind.

Each morning, no matter where the morning may find me, I open my artistic journals and pour into them these entangled words formulating in my mind. These disheveled words are a derivative of places and things that I find wonder with the understanding of why.

My mixed media type art journals typically include words, imagery, paint and heavy visual content. They are not just archiving my thoughts, but also my art and what it is that I do. Each entry is about playing and exploring the combined techniques of drawing, painting, writing, doodling, collaging and sketching. They are a playground for self-expression and a way to document and remember details of daily life and the diagrams of dreams.

I place thoughts and words in the order of which they arrive, often incomplete in the moment as their freedom is not yet curtailed or contained. As I look back and caress them with more liberation, they come alive with the complete thought and message to be delivered without containment.

These words are from my current journal, which is being created in a Readers Digest Great World Atlas, that I’m manipulating the pages of.

May 28, 2024

It was a day of remembrance, yet there was little thought to those who gave the ultimate sacrifice. Tethered to the end of different colorful leashes, that also held small fashionable containers of plastic bags, were dogs of various breeds and pedigrees, few of which had any manners. This spectacle was nauseating and hideous as they squatted and dropped so the humans could pick up behind them. As the warm air filled with the stench of waste matter discharged from the intestines of canines, all I wanted was a breath of fresh air and perhaps to see a cantankerous and disagreeable ancient goat chewing on an old rusty tin can. It would have been a tremendous relief in the delirium of the jumbled subhuman impression that was being paraded.

July 11, 2024

I felt it long ago, it was a gentle tug, but I took notice. I then allowed myself to feel a pull deeper from the depth of myself, the self that I was created for. I exist where I’m at with comfort, as I don’t allow myself to be pushed around by fear and misinformation. I still feel the deeper pull and continue to be led by all the dreams that I chase in my heart.

July 29, 2024

As we know value, or at least seem to, we understand that oil, timber, minerals and the owning of real estate have growing value. What we have looked over and abused is to profit from this value of open spaces, unspoiled beauty, wildlife and solitude is diminishing the value and need for spiritual renewal.

August 15, 2024

I grant the opportunity to make myself available whenever needed. However, I don’t believe I want to always be needed. I’m still debating with myself whether to be part of a historical change of consciousness that will launch some type of Cultural Revolution. Will we, as a group of humans, want so badly so many different things, most of which are filled with cruelty, greed and are completely unnecessary. These wants seem to never step forward and enlighten the human populace and improve the sensibility of man.

August 20, 2024

It’s as if we are trapped in a sanitized room. Everything is to function perfectly without mishap and the toilet seat has been sanitized. I am to believe this because everything is labeled that it has been done. We have been trained to accept these signs with comforting approval. The whole spirit of the place, the principle of conscious life is that man has been made to believe what has become false and delusional.

These erroneous spaces depress me beyond words. The heinous flow of false security seeps through the walls. If I were forced to occupy these settings for any length of time, I believe I would take the final plunge into insanity. Never has the statuesque seemed so horrible and frightful.

This place in which we exist is not the worst place I have been, but being in a place with no spirit knocks my soul hard. I escape by turning back to what is now referred to as the, “third world.” Here, out of a type of self-preservation, I explore the so-called backward and underdeveloped.

There may be misery and suffering throughout these lands of having less, but the worst suffering encountered is in the heat of greed and progress. Here in all the “third world” countries I’ve traveled to, I found an abundance of kindness, love, compassion and forgiveness. Here, there seems to be less room for deceit, anger and hate.

September 4, 2024

We cannot fail without being a failure, just as we make mistakes without being unsuccessful. Before we can be taught anything we first must learn to think. When you think you complete what is you and brings yourself to a power of choice. Nothing can be changed from those who cannot change in their own minds first.

All of this finds residence in my artistic journals. I find enjoyment with sharing, be it this column, with texting, or revealing them in photos and videos on social media. I am not trying to connive anyone into following my beliefs; my hope is to evoke a thought of your own. - dbA

You can find more of the unfiltered insight and the Art of Dan Abernathy at www.contributechaos.com.