Page 15 - the NOISE February 2014

Cover artist Erica Faerio’s vibrant watercolors are exemplified in Transformation at the Base (LEFT) and Mergence (RIGHT).
by
sarah gIanellI
GRAND DeSiGN: NATURe’S WiSDoM SPoKeN iN THe LANGUAGe oF ART
Erica Fareio is the kind of person whom, after speaking to, you feel lifted up, affirmed and inspired, ready to reenter the world with a recharged light of your own. She lives the kind of healthy lifestyle to support that: practices yoga and meditation, and spends a lot of time outdoors and, of course, making art. She sees her paintings as a meditation tool to help her- self and others tune into the interconnected- ness of all existence and the potential therein.
“Everybody needs tools to help them deal with the craziness of life,” says Ms. Fareio. “As a child, I found peace more so in nature than around friends and family. So I started observ- ing nature and spending time with myself at a young age. As life goes on, and we have hard experiences and ups and downs, you look to things that are going to help you deal and grow. I believe art can do that because it has its own language. It comes from a deeper place beyond the mind, where there aren’t words or concepts, and a person can receive a message or an insight that maybe I didn’t even intend, and gather their own insight from it. Maybe it will expand somebody’s perspective, get them to think outside the box, help them realize their own connection, or the next time they go out in nature for a light bulb to turn on.”
The repetitive patterns in nature have al- ways jumped out at Ms. Fareio; in the move- ment of water, the striated walls of a canyon, the bark of a tree, the skin of a snake. “I don’t know how other people see,” says the artist.
“But ever since I was a kid I could see, hear, feel, taste, everything to the nth degree. I can pick out the patterns, shapes and repetitive geom- etry that show how nature is always moving and evolving. Even rocks are moving, they’re moving really slowly, but they’re moving. It’s
that aliveness that I’m trying to capture.”
Her paintings, whose detailed, fluid lines
give the illusion of moving themselves, have ti- tles that offer a concept for contemplation, and illustrate how the wisdom available in nature applies to us as individuals and to humanity as a whole. Sometimes Ms. Fareio writes an inspi- rational poem to accompany her paintings.
For Letting go, featured on this month’s cover, Ms. Fareio’s poem reads: “I learn from the trees to let go of my leaves / and the things that no longer serve me. / And when I let go, I make room for new growth / and let the love of the universe embrace me!”
One of her most recent works, Bija, on display at West of the Moon, is the Sanskrit word for seed, and depicts the rare desert Sego lily triumphing up through the rocky soil of Utah’s Cedar Mesa Sandstone. In Dive Deep, a goddess figure is camouflaged in the upward flow of a cresting wave.
“If you’ve ever swam in the ocean you know you can dive underneath the waves to calmer water,” says Ms. Fareio. “The concept is to dive inside of ourselves to a deeper place where we are able to observe the crashing waves, or whatever is going on in our lives emotionally, from a calmer place. As with all of my paintings, I’m using nature as a meta- phor to express our experiences.”
Ms. Fareio has worked as a Colorado River guide for 20 years, and while she has branched out considerably in terms of subject matter, she credits her experiences in Grand Canyon as the “mother source” of her artistic inspira- tion. Although she didn’t particularly like wa- tercolors, she was forced to experiment with the medium because it was convenient to bring on the river. She found that she could, in fact, attain the bright colors and definition she wanted, by applying many layers of paint
and using ink to create the detail.
One particularly powerful piece called Sa-
tori (which Ms. Fareio translates as a glimpse of enlightenment brought on by birth, death or the forces of nature), was directly inspired by an October day on the river. It portrays a well-known downstream view of Grand Can- yon’s Nankoweap granary ruins. The rafters took shelter in the granaries during a torren- tial downpour that created hundreds of spon- taneous waterfalls down the canyon.
“The power and the forces were incredible,” she says. “Everybody was stunned, and for us guides, who had been down there so often, to have an experience that was just so com- pletely off the Richter scale ... everybody just went to another place. An experience like that can’t not shift your perspective in a major way.”
This year Ms. Fareio was invited to be the featured artist of The Whale Foundation, a nonprofit organization created in the 90s to be a support system for the Grand Canyon river guiding community. Inspired by Curtis
“Whale” Hanson, a legendary river guide and Vietnam Vet who struggled with substance abuse and eventually committed suicide, The Whale Foundation provides confidential ac- cess to mental and physical health care profes- sionals and a network of services designed to restore, promote, and maintain the well-being of the Grand Canyon river guiding community.
“They have a hotline for depression and sub- stance abuse; provide financial aid, give away scholarships, and do free medical screenings,” says Ms. Fareio. “It’s a really amazing organiza- tion.” Ms. Fareio’s painting Mergence, of the confluence of the Little Colorado and Mother Colorado rivers, was selected as the central image for The Whale Foundation’s 12th annual
“Wing Ding” fundraising event. A few of her pieces will also be up for auction at the event.
Like her intent for Mergence, which is to show how we can be our unique, individual selves — just like each wave in the river — but ultimately are made of the same medium, Transformation at the Base is a call for a more radical, holistic transformation. The coiled snake represents our potential, ready and waiting to spring into action. Dense rock formations at the bottom of the piece are mirrored with crystals above, and continents, trees and figures morph into one another on the borders. “The idea is if dark black dense rocks can recrystallize into some- thing so clear, then what potential do we have as humans?” she says. “Maybe we’ve got to fully dissolve everything and create a new founda- tional base entirely in order to reach it.
“I think that humans have the potential to be loving and happy,” says Ms. Fareio. “I think it can be a much more beautiful place, but we all have to start with ourselves. For me, I just try to be a good person, set by example, have more compassion and be patient ... everybody’s on their own path, everybody’s at where they’re at. I believe if we had a mo- ment in somebody else’s shoes, no matter who, that maybe we’d get it. We’d have a deeper understanding of each other and re- alize it’s so much bigger than us.”
Ms. Fareio’s paintings and prints can be found in Flagstaff’s West of the Moon Gal- lery, 14 N. San Francisco St.; at Zen Moun- tain Gallery, 515 Main St. in Jerome; and for a limited time at Arizona Stronghold Tasting Room in Old Town Cottonwood. The Whale Foundation Wing Ding fundraiser is from 6-11PM Saturday, February 22 at Co- conino Center for the Arts, 2300 N. Fort Val- ley Rd. For more information or to donate an item for auction, visit whalefoundation.org or call 928-774-9440.
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