MIXED MEDIA PAINTINGS
No god No guru 32"x40" Acrylic on matt board Pamella Allen 2021
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No god No guru 32”x40” Acrylic on mat board ©️Pamella Allen 2021 The process for me is a release, an exploration of emotion manifested visually. Finally finished after 4 years. This self study was hard to finish, it speaks to grief and tragic loss, no god and no guru can make it ok that my beloved brother left this earth down south in such unresolved mystery, it will never be ok, as the prose states in this work. |
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Ella I 28”x22”x1” Acrylic & mixed media on canvas ©️Pamella Allen 2020 The self-study is a device I have always used to see myself beyond the gaze that daily greets in the mirror. It is an observation girded by the desire to find place and see myself in it. The black, the mystery is a safe space, it is where I find what is missing it is where I can find my beloved. The head bowed in reverence, the shower of flower is the mother, the father the mother the brother the brother the elders the ancestors. Black the beautiful mystery here; a safe space shimmers in the copper elements of earth. The continual lines barley discernible illustrated to replicate my form captured for a finite moment in time. |
Ella I - 28"x22'x1" Acrylic and mixed media on canvas Pamella Allen 2020
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Humming Dragon 63"x63"x2" Acrylic & mixed media on canvas Pamella Allen 2019
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Humming Dragon 63"x63"x2" Acrylic, volcanic san, and mixed media on canvas ©️Pamella Allen 2020 “HummingDragon” ( transcribed text from the work) Ma Lung breaths in the natural mystic Wings beat to shape infinity Ma Lung breaths in the natural mystic Ma Lung breaths in the natural mystic The great psychopan Moving between worlds Ma Lung breaths in the natural mystic Wings to beat to shape infinity Ma Lung Breaths Love Ma Lung breaths in the natural mystic Odonoda Ma Lung breaths in the natural mystic Odonoda moves in the 6 directions Ma Lung breaths in the natural mystic Ma Lung beats wings to shape infinity |
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Ahimsa 60"x60"x2" Acrylic hand made paper, sand, quartz crystal & mixed media on canvas ©️Pamella Allen 2017 Ahimsa, translated from Sanskrit is "do no harm" . In my travels I have seen the same face on a person from southern India, as from Jamaica, or Kenya, or Spain. The Ahimsa mandala is the face of peaceful meditation as an archetype. 5 years in the making, Ahimsa began as a series of memory sketch/ink drawings, followed by a series of stencils and mono prints that evolved to clay sculpture and molds to finally make over 100 hand-made paper relief sculptures that I layered and collaged onto paper and fabric with graphite and sand to complete the Ahimsa mandala. The process of paper making is an ancient one, it is one of reconstruction after deconstruction, a mirror to the cycles of life death life found in nature. The mantra here is straightforward, Ahimsa is a meditation on peace and the regenerative cycles of nature. |
Ahimsa 60"x60"x1.5" Acrylic hand-made paper, sand, quartz &mixed media on canvas Pamella Allen 2019
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"ME & MEMORY"32X46X2.5 ACRYLIC, SAND, SILK AND MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS 2018
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Me & Memory
32”x46”x2” Acrylic, sand, silk, photo print, and mixd media on canvas ©️Pamella Allen 2018 ( Featured in, Brooklyn on My Mind, Black Visual Artists From the WPA to the Present by Myrah Brown Green) The self study and the dichotomy is a constant in my practice. In this work there is a reaching to hold and a releasing to let go. Layered in sand, silk and dragonfly symbology, in this self study it is the duality. The mandala here is collaged with memory captured with my camera on my travels. It is a daily conversation captured with my young friend Issaac on the white sands of Kande Village in Malawi, the natural sculptured landscape of driftwood island visited by kayak with my friend Ginny exploring the inlets of Long Island and it is the butter candles at the temple in Dharamshala encased in glass and forever burning inside of yet another self portrait in profile. |
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The Language of Listening 25.5"x30.5” (this is the original size) Acrylic, sand, pen & ink and mixed media on paper ©️Pamella Allen 2017 "If you were blessed with the language of listening what knowledge would sing into your soul?" it is a question explored in this work, a question that echoes throughout my arts practice in image and prose that informs all aspects of life for me its about a seeking, a quest for knowledge. A mantra applied to the circle on the blackest depths of the universe and scribed in golds and silvers; colors of the elements embedded in sand and stone from the waters edge. |
The Language of Listening 26"x26"x1.5" Acrylic, pen & ink and mixed media on paper Pamella Allen 2017
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"LIFE IS MYSTERY LOVE" 30X30X1 ENCAUSTIC, RICE PAPER AND MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS PAMELLA ALLEN 2018
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Life is Mystery Love 30”x30”x1” Encaustic, rice paper & mixed media on canvas ©️Pamella Allen 2018 The self study is a constant in my practice, here I capture myself in departure from the viewer to what is known or in arrival to the mystery to what is unknown. Encaustic the resin from the tree and the wax from the bee are magical to me. They are layered with the cracked black of the finite and speak to life's perfect dichotomy. The repetitive prose or mantra in this piece is “Life is Mystery love & A peace of the Soul”, one is a statement of truth, the other is a desire. |
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DactaBird 30"x30"x2" Acrylic. volcanic sand, citrine & mixed media on canvas ©️Pamella Allen 2020 The Doctor (Dacta) Bird, the [Swallow Tail Hummingbird] is the national bird of my homeland of Jamaica. It is said that the Tainos ( Jamaicas first inhabitants) considered Doctor Birds to be the reincarnated souls of the ancestors and called them them “the God bird”. The hummingbird is a wonder! Its wings beat to the shape of infinity (the figure 8) it can fly backward and upside down at will, its heart is the largest of all living creatures compared to its body size and every night the magical hummingbird goes into a hibernation-like state called Torpor. Hummingbirds have inspired and amazed me all of my life and are a recurring theme is my arts practice. I have added the Semi-precious stone Citrine to the center of this painting to bring additional positive solar energy and vibrant flow to this work and everyone in the space it inhabits. |
DactaBird
30"x30"x2"
Acrylic. volcanic sand, citrine & mixed media on canvas
©️Pamella Allen 2020
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Ella II - 28"x22"x1" Acrylic and mixed media on canvas Pamella Allen 2020
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Ella II 28”x22”x1” Acrylic & mixed media on canvas ©️Pamella Allen 2018 The self-study a recurring theme in my arts practice and the full-on gaze reminds me to see and be seen clearly; to make visible to myself what society seems to wish to erase. This full-on gaze is also reminiscent of the only photo portrait that I have of my late mother that hung at the focal point on my bedroom wall where I grew up. When I create my portraits & memory sketches I often make faces that gaze directly out eyes firmly fixed on you, the factual symbolism of the missing mother whose gaze will always meet yours through the haze of memory, lived experience water, sky& flowers again recur and bring balance to me and hopefully to the viewer. |
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Tara & The Dragon ( Blu Dragon)
63"x63"x2" Acrylic and mixed media on canvas ©️Pamella Allen 2019 The works incorporated into the body of this mandala are “BabyGirl Tara”, an oil painting that I created while in a residency in India and “A Peace” which is an encaustic painting inspired by my love of sailing & life on the oceans. The dragonfly is another symbol that I love and is revered by cultures across the world for its healing magic and resilient nature. As in most of my works, I have incorporated my prose but here it is buried, a brief excerpt inspired by a creation story about the Dragonfly: “Ma Lung breaths in the natural mystic Odonoda beats clarity on iridescent wings of change Odonoda sings Ixchel back to life Odonoda breaths in the natural mystic” To create this series of mixed media paintings, I have appropriated the ritual, therapeutic and storytelling use of the mandala in cultures throughout history from Africa, to Asia and the Americas. To make My Mandalas, I use my own artifacts and archetypal images, the motion of repetitive form, the written word, and earth elements such as sand and soil to create a landscape grounded in the mystic of nature. The desire is to make a place of "one-ness" in the process of creating these works that translates to the viewer as a place of inspired peace, a place of meditation |
Tara & The Dragon 63"x63"x2" Acrylic & mixed media on canvas Pamella Allen 2019
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She & Dacta Bird 63"x63"x2" Acrylic, sand, glass & mixed media on canvas Pamella Allen 2019
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She & Dacta Bird
63"x63"x2.5” Acrylic and mixed media on canvas ©️Pamella Allen 2019 The Swallowtail Hummingbird, nicknamed “Dacta Bird” is the national bird of my homeland of Jamaica. It is said that the Tainos (Jamaicas first inhabitants) considered these birds to be the reincarnated souls of the ancestors and called them “the God bird”. Hummingbirds are an inspiration and a recurring theme is my arts practice. Its wings beat to the shape of infinity figure 8) it can fly backward and upside down at will, its heart is the largest of all living creatures compared to its body size and every night the magical hummingbird goes into a hibernation-like state called Torpor. The text or mantra in this work speaks to the symbology of, and my reverence for the hummingbird. "ma lung breathes in the natural mystic, the divine psychopan, the great turning with wings that beat to infinity". To create this series of mixed media paintings, I have appropriated the ritual, therapeutic and storytelling use of the perfect circle in cultures throughout history from Africa, to Asia and the Americas. To make these works, I use my own artifacts and archetypal images, the motion of repetitive form, the written word, and earth elements such as sand and soil to create a landscape grounded in the mystic of nature. The desire is to make a place of "one-ness" in the process of creating these works that translates to the viewer as a place of inspired peace, a place of meditation. |
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My Green Tara 30"x30"x2.5" Acrylic, rice paper & mixed media on canvas ©️Pamella Allen 2018 "My Green Tara" tells the story of Cityscapes, Naturescapes & Oceans that I have seen from Dharamshala to the Maasai Mara, from Galu Kinondo to Kerala. Although I propound no dogma, I see the truths running through all religious practices in the origin of thier intent and the similarities in all of these creation myths meet in my work and in this work it is clearly evident. Moment, memory and the mystic of nature is always the muse as I create and appropriate lived experience by layering and collage of deconstructed visual elements that I illustrate, paint or photograph along with tactile elements created by nature that I gather on my journeys over land and sea. |
My Green Tara 30'x30"x2" Acrylic rice paper and mixed media on canvas Pamella Allen 2018
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A Peace 16"x20" Encaustic on Canvas pamella Allen 2018
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A Peace 16”x20” Encaustic on Canvas ©️Pamella Allen 2018 As my work is layered in process elements of nature take hold, here it is with resin and bees wax the encaustic medium calls me to carve prose into the work; words reflecting on my reverence for the oceans and love for sailing that dropped down to me as I mix and combine elemental colors of oceanic earth and the universe. The repetitive prose in this work is, “On my Oceans I find A Peace of The Soul”. |
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DeConstructed 31.5"x31.5" (framed) Acrylic, silk, rice paper and mixed media on canvas ©️Pamella Allen 2018 In this work as in life, we are created in a constant state of constructed and de-construted tides. I was curious to see what the fully created mixed media piece would become if I continued to make & un-make it over an over again. "Light like a feather, heavy as lead" |
DeConstructed 31"x31"x2 Acrylic and mixed media on canvas Pamella Allen 2018
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