Who is Darlene?

I am a sliver of light trying to spill out of a box.

As an artist, what are your favourite ways to express yourself?

These days, I am enamored with one line poems that I can fit into a tweet and the lushness of a polaroid image or black and white film, preferably neopan or tri-x. I am working on a large scale project that has me working with polaroid print transfers, paint and collage, poetry and encaustic wax ~ don’t expect to see anything soon as I expect it will take me another 6 months to a year before I am ready to reveal it all but it is my current consuming expression.

She is the blue blown breeze of regret as her breath sings out the poetry of her hopeful heart.

What is your creative process?

I wish I had a creative process that involved a beautiful ritual of loose leaf tea and a spot where light dances in peaceful introspection or a Japanese garden that I meditated in before beginning to create but I don’t. If I have a deadline, my process looks something like this:

1. have a million conversations in my head on ideas and convince myself that I know exactly what I’m going to do. This would be the brainstorm section of my process.
2. procrastinate.
3. procrastinate.
4. procrastinate some more.
5. freak out. This would be the motivational part of my process where I rant and rave and wonder why I even agreed to the project/show/job.
6. cry. A good cry is as good as a good laugh.
7. laugh. A good laugh is as good as a good cry.
8. start working.
9. realize that a part of my brain has been working on this since the beginning (return to 1.) and remember this is part of my process and relax.
10. work like a crazed madwoman filled with creative energy.
11. relax and contemplate that I need a new process because a sane person shouldn’t work this way.

If I don’t have a deadline, my process looks something like this:

1. have a million conversations in my head on ideas and convince myself that I know exactly what I’m going to do. This looks much like the process when I have a deadline except far less focused and crosses all my artistic loves.
2. write a list of everything I want to do.
3. talk to friends about the projects that sit in my heart.
4. realize I am too busy to devote any real solid chunks of time to it.
5. somehow manage to do little bits of work here and there as I move through my days.
6. continue doing little bits of work here and there as I move through my days.
7. years go by.
8. realize that I have amassed a body of work that matches that list of brainstormed ideas.
9. realize that a part of my brain has been working on this since the beginning (return to 1.) and remember this is part of my process and I should trust and surrender to it.
10. work like a madwoman filled with creative energy.
11. relax and contemplate that I need a new process because a sane person shouldn’t work this way.

Mostly I am a bit of a goof who is inspired to spontaneously create as i go about living my life …

What are you moved to express in your writing, art, photography the most?

The essence of my subject ~ light, love and hope.

She used to smile and say, “the light is kissing your face” as we lay watching the dust dance in the triangle stream like sparkles revealed by the magic of the sun. we never truly leave childhood loves behind us, we carry them with us in a pouch buried in the cracks of our soul, the cracks that let the light in and the cracks that allow our light out.

I have found a space inside of me that becomes so mesmerized by the differing light depending on the angle of the day or the filtering of the trees and clouds and bits of fluff that we use to hide behind, so mesmerized that my daydreams lose all time and thought. my words are caught in the flame of the sun’s heat and burn up trickling ash along the soft floorboards of time.

How do handle an interruption in the flow of imagination or writer’s block?

Life is one big beautiful interruption. I have always had concentration problems and issues with hyperactivity or attention deficit disorder and perhaps as a consequence, I tend to juggle a lot of pretty coloured balls so having time to sit and work on something for long stretches of time is a great luxury in my world. Because, I am slave to so many artistic passions while also juggling a full time demanding career and a heartbreakingly beautiful family, if I am blocked in one area (like writing), I immediately move to something else (like photography) and in working on something else (like photography), I immediately find inspiration for my writing.

What brings you joy, contentment, happiness?

The heart of my little family, the laughter of my friends and the music of life.

What do the words ‘yes’ and ‘possibility’ mean to you personally?

Every time I have said yes especially those times when I have been most fearful, I have opened a door filled with possibilities. Saying ‘yes’ can lead you down the rabbit hole and help to clarify what it really is that your heart needs and what it really is that you are saying yes to and sometimes that comes with the realization that it is time to close that door and tumble down a different rabbit hole and sometimes that yes will shrink you and sometimes it will make you so much larger than you ever thought possible.

For me, ‘yes’ and ‘possibility’ are easy, it’s a rearranging of molecules, a head tilt to change the perspective view. I have no problem saying yes and I have never had a problem believing in possibility. I think my challenge these days has been learning that saying ‘no’ isn’t necessarily a negative and sometimes saying ‘no’ creates stronger possibility for creating the life that brings me the most light.

I have recently changed one of my stories to align more with who I am today. I used to be filled with so much anxiety and fear that I would actually have to talk myself into leaving the house every day. I will also admit to you that I once became so paralyzed with fear, that I couldn’t leave my apartment. I would sneak out at three in the morning, my dark hoodie covering my head as I raced to the convenient store to buy cigarettes (back when I was a smoker) and then race back to the safety of my curtained up four walls. I stopped answering the phone and might still be there today were it not for a friend who knocked down my door and dragged me back out into the light.

And so I said ‘yes’ to living and fear became my guiding light, the more fear I had, the quicker I would jump into ‘yes’. It was this way of living that gives me such a rich history of experiences.

The thing is. I am no longer fear ridden. Somewhere over the years of all that doing and jumping and leaping, my strength and power overcame the fear. But I held on tight to that old story to the point that it began to make me smaller than I am, I started living small because I was still using fear as a guiding light but I am no longer filled with the same anxieties. I am strong and only starting to understand how much power is inside of me, how much love and beauty. These days I am saying ‘no’ to all that doesn’t serve the person I am inside, the beauty that lives inside of me. I can’t wait to see where it takes me.

I think that the essence of ‘yes’ or ‘no’ or ‘possibility’ is the true listening followed by the surrender to the whispers of the heart.

“she set upon her heart’s journey knowing that every path would bring a fresh light of understanding”

How has saying ‘yes’ in your life changed the trajectory of your life?

saying ‘yes’ to my heart, to the possibilities that i read about in word filled books allowed me to leave behind poverty and a girl whose future was hidden in a trailer park of skinned knee belief in the last inhale of a drug filled smoke, a gulp of whiskey raw. i said yes to packing all my belongings into the back of a truck; to big city lights and a university filled with new ideas; to writing poetry and plays, to opening up my heart to the risk of failure and heartbreak; to love; to risk; to live.

What holds you back?

I used to scoff at contentment, I saw it as a sort of death. Picture a feisty girl in red dyed pigtails, black rimmed eyes rolled at the thought of being content. That said, what is holding me back these days is that very contented happiness and I am totally okay with that because for me, now … that is the point. What I mean by that is that I have never felt held back and I have always moved into the possibility of my life but sometimes I can get distracted from creating or sharing my creations because I can get lost in watching the light dance or the I can spend hours just listening to the leaves whisper their perfect poetry. I can lose time in the conversation of hearts and the laughter and love of a perfectly formed human being. Moments of contentment and happiness can hold me back and I am totally okay with that because for me, that is the point. And I can laugh at my younger self and give her a hug knowing that was her point too only she was to scared to believe she would ever truly be happy. I am happy to prove her wrong.

Who are your creative role models? What books, art, music inspire and ignite you?

Books, art and music have inspired me from the time I was a little girl to now and I am sure will continue to do so well into my future. However, I am not going to present you with a list because I haven’t read a book or viewed a work of art or listened to a line of music without finding inspiration and without being moved to an emotion or a passion and I read hundreds upon hundreds of books in a year and have since I was a small child and I live in a house filled with music coming up through the floorboards almost nightly as my husband’s rehearsal space is just below my studio space. And art. I breathe it in daily.

But.

I will talk to you about my creative role models because they are the influences that sit in my heart still to this day.

* My mother is an artist and she used to point to the sky and ask me what colour it was. I would say blue and she would ask me to look closer until I could see the thread of pink and the hue of purple, the glow of orange, the yellow smile. She taught me to see the light.
* My grandmother and I would walk in silence honouring the earth and how she lives and breathes to create beauty in the drift of a cloud, the purple sky and the way every blade of grass sings loudly with beauty. She was native and she taught me to honour the earth, the most important creative role model any of us have. She taught me to honour the light.
* My sister created love and joy with her eyes. She had a severe form of cerebral palsy and couldn’t form sentences or even words like most of us but we had conversations with our eyes and she taught me that there is a language beyond the most common form of communication, she taught me listen with my entire being. She taught me to dance in the light.
* My twin boys, brief blossoms in my life before they moved on into a different light. They introduced me to stillness and acceptance and taught me that our creations are not always allowed to grow and sometimes the real beauty is in the act of creation and there is learning to be had in the letting go, in the surrender to that which we have no control over. It was a long lesson that took me years to learn. I am still learning. They taught me I am the light.

What do you give yourself unconditionally in life to?

love

12. Where has love taken you?

Love has taken me to the possibilities that exist inside of me and to the hopeful beauty of the world.

She plucks and colours and pastes on masks. She dangles jewels in exotic colours. She perfumes the scent of her being. She is beautiful. Her fresh skin is unadorned. She drapes misshapen fabric around her body. Her smell is clean, her hair flies free. She is beautiful. She is comfortable with the scars and marks of childbirth. She is comfortable in the angles and lack of curves of youth. She enjoys the burgeoning expanse of skin as she ages. She is beautiful. The wrinkles mould her face. The colour streams away from her hair. She is beautiful. In his eyes.

If there were absolutely no obstacles what would you do tomorrow?

There are always going to be obstacles, they just continually change as circumstances change which is why it is impossible for me to answer this question until I am living tomorrow which, of course, would be today. I will say to you that a long time ago when I was still a pigtailed child eye’s wide as the world threw me the most perfectly formed imperfect curve ball, I decided that it was the obstacles that I seemed to be continually faced with that would shape my future and that I should embrace them. I believed then that if I was to be a writer/photographer/artist then I should be grateful for every experience and that included the ones that seemed to want to get in my way.

What is on your wish list?

I have a reoccurring memory of myself, sitting in the hot sun, cross legged staring down at the ground, face in concentration as I wished into the future. I used to make a lot of wishes blowing them to the sky, deep down into the earth. I have recently had the realization that those wishes of my younger self have all come to fruition. I am living the life I always dreamed so desperately about – right now, in this moment, I have no wish list because I want to be in these moments, honour this life that I wished so hard to have.

Its easy I think to want to keep piling on wishes on top of wishes but what is the point of wishing if you don’t take the time to enjoy the wishes you once had. For the moment, I am enjoying though I am sure more wishes will dance there way into my life.

famous last words?

you know …. i exist.

Darlene J Kreutzer lives in a wee colourful cottage with her musician husband and sports-minded son in a lovely old eclectic neighbourhood in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. When she is not scribbling in her notebooks or playing with light, she can usually be found sketching, painting, twisting up jewerly designs, puttering in her kitchen and tending her garden.

She is grateful for family, the light that casts beauty across shadows, music that lifts emotions, a little house and garden filled with colour and love, friends and inspirations, the beauty of nature, the ocean’s cold spray, the soft barnacle skin of the grey whale and the possibilities that exist in life.

She shares snippets of her life and current obsessions at hippy urban girl