I paint in a non objective style as a way to loosen up. Non objective refers to a creation of an image with out an intentional subject. I let the colors and composition flow until I reach a stopping point. There have been plenty of times that I will start over after going too far, and that is why I love painting. You can always start over.
While at the Academy Minerva in 1996 as an art student in Groningen Netherlands I was introduced to painting micro landscapes using an electron microscope. I spent hours in the studio making non objective organic textural compositions until one day my professor asked if I would join him at the Hanzehhogeschool for a chance to sketch from micro images. It was fantastic. I can still sense these early impressions of the micro world on my current work. My favorite subject to paint was a totally out of this world micro texture found on the surface of insects. I spent hours observing and sketching the area between the eyes of a common house fly. The subjects are covered in gold which reflects the electrons into a HD image on a TV screen. Fun fun fun.
The other part of creating non objective paintings is that there are four different paintings on one canvass. By eliminating a horizon or subject you can hang the canvass all four directions with a completely unique feeling to each orientation.
Mark Duran Art 
I’m just getting the hang of the whole blogging experience, so I left a comment about my interest in the micro imaging under your blog about the beautiful eagle sculpture/totem. I’m enjoying the examples of your art; I have only a small bit of experience using art as therapy for my own PTSD but have found it enormously satisfying and effective despite my very limited talents in the visual artistic area. Maybe that’s why the non objective work appeals to me — I love painting on silk because the colors are so, satisfying I guess I would say. Viscerally satisfying. But I find representational art very difficult:) Anyway, so many of your tags draw me that I look forward to exploring your site and blog. Blessed Be, Meg (Dancing Warrior)
Hello,
The great thing about painting is that there are no rules. Non objective is another word for play time. PTSD leads our minds into unwanted thoughts. With a brush and some color we can replace the bad with some good and have an image to share. Keep on painting!
And sometimes getting the bad out, onto an external surface, can serve as a channel to allow it to leave us with a little more room for peace inside. 🙂
Yes absolutely. The flow of paint replaces negative thoughts or the paint takes on the pain that gets transferred to the canvas to be locked away for ever.
Working with athletes a similar action was called “treeing”- where some one is bothered by all these negative thoughts unable to focus on the training. I would advise them to leave all that negativity on a tree for the time being. While refocusing on optimal performance. All that stuff is waiting on the tree if they ever want it back. Funny thing is they never went back to the tree.
What a great exercise/ritual! And trees are a wonderful “receptor” for our pain — the fact that they are living beings, existing on such a different time from that which we as humans do. I’m not sure I said that coherently, but I guess what I mean is that the lifespan of a tree is so long that it can help us with perspective. I would add a gift for the tree, for taking on my burden, but only because I was taught to make an offering of thanks when picking part of a plant or tree. For example I will pull a hair from my head if I am harvesting flowers and offer it to the plant. Kind of New Agey, but it does create an even deeper sense of connection to the life of the plant or tree. And I can understand not going back to the tree to reclaim one’s pain; for me that would be even more reason to honor its service to us. It certainly sounds as though those whom you advise are lucky to have you. In what capacity do you serve as such a guide?