APPRECIATIVE CONSCIOUSNESS: Learning To Go Beyond Perception

by Malcolm D. Evans

Appreciative consciousness is marked by a constantly changing mix of mind and body. What we perceive, what we already know, what we feel, and what we imagine are a wondrous stew that at times brings us to peak experiences of rapture or despair. That long established trilogy of mind, body, and spirit is clearly present in appreciative consciousness. But Meland would have us re-think the separateness of mind, body, and spirit to embrace the unifying concept of wholeness—the fusion of our perceptions, our actions, and our emotions. If we turn to Joanna Foslien’s tapestry, Ocean of Becoming, we can begin to understand the wholeness of appreciative consciousness. – TT p11-12

above, Joanna Foslien, Ocean of Becoming

When I first saw this tapestry my response, without much thought was, “it’s evocative.” What made me make such a statement? It was not rational, and not illustrative of analysis and criticism. Yet, my heart, my feelings, told me in totally unvoiced ways that this is more than a fine example of technique; I felt something more than mere appreciation. I felt a communication, a partial awareness of the artist’s feelings of flow, of spiritual communion, of transcending her loom in an experience beyond technique and design. Foslien gives us some insight in this message on a signboard at a recent showing of her works. – TT p12

above, Joanna Foslien, Ocean of Becoming, detail

. . . An idea drawn from Picasso permeates much of the work — that is, to look at things from many different angles: from above, from below, from outside looking in, from inside looking out. Images are layered just as there are many possible layers of insight. Space and depth infiltrate the flat surface probing feelings of disorientation. There is an intention to produce a sense of movement, which is an enigma, because images and fragments of images are all frozen in time. Time itself is measured in the regular accretion of the cloth. The history of weft over warp, weft under warp ad infinitum is laid out in a regular pattern. The unfathomable and unreachable are similarly marked off. Exhibit (December, 2003). St. Paul, MN: The Undercroft Gallery of Saint Matthew’s Episcopal Church. – TT p12

above, Joanna Foslien, Ocean of Becoming, detail

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