Abby Raeder Contemplative Photographer
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Spring's Scent and Sensuality

3/20/2016

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One never knows when an amazing gift will come your way.

A dozen roses showed up on my doorstep this week. These weren't your garden variety roses, but deep persimmon roses. They were beautiful and they knew it. Not only were these roses dazzling, they screamed Spring, calling me into action.

​With the morning sunlight casting a radiant glow on these perfect posies, I reached for my camera, and clicked and clicked away.
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I immediately went into the Georgia O'Keeffe mode, seeing the sensual abstractions that revealed themselves, tucked deep within their layered folds, as water droplets clung to their fleshy surface.
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When you take a flower in your hand and really look at it, it's your world for the moment. I want to give that world to someone else. Most people in the city rush around so, they have no time to look at a flower. I want them to see it whether they want to or not."
​~ Georgia O'Keeffe
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This is why I love photography, discovering the hidden form and beauty in the everyday. The scent and sensuality of flowers is nothing to sneeze at.
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I hate flowers - I paint them because they're cheaper than models and they don't move."
​~ Georgia O'Keeffe
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Live in color,
Abby
HAPPY SPRING!
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To Scry or Not to Scry

3/1/2016

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Every culture since the beginning of time has done it. The Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Celts, all the way back to the Babylonians have done it. It was time I gave it a try.
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Scrying is the practice of looking into a reflective surface, examining the non-physical shapes and images that reveal themselves to you. Scrying creates a meditative state in which you only focus on the patterns and lines before you. Different items may be used as a focus tool, water is the most common, however, mirrors, crystals, smoke, flames and even clouds has been used throughout time. In my case I chose ice, for which there is an abundance in Vermont, as the ground wakes from its winter slumber.
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With spring approaching, the rivers and streams of the Green Mountains are choked with massive, thick slabs of ice moving downstream. Like giant building blocks, strewn along the riverbanks, they called me in for a closer examination. The slabs average 6 inches deep, with some pieces spanning several feet wide. On this day the surface of these hulking blocks of ice turn into reflective pools of light from the warm March afternoon sun, a perfect opportunity for Scrying.
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Looking closely into these glistening glacial blocks reveals the cracks, scars and frozen bubbles from a winter with too many thaws and freezes. An icy cross-section can hold intriguing shapes and figures for the viewer. The mind struggles to find meaning in the abstract, but eventually it quietly settles into the hum of an internal wisdom, unmasking only what needs to be seen.

Whether we choose to scry or to simply commit to seeing more deeply there is an abundance of highly cool stuff out there to astonish and amaze. We can never have too much amazement, can we?

​Live in color,
Abby
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  • Home
  • About
    • About Abby
    • Artist Statement
    • NGOs and Me
  • Gallery
    • Everyday Wonder
    • Through The Looking Glass
    • A Space To Breathe
  • Musings
  • Contact