Die Schatzhüterin
“Die Schatzhüterin” is a collaborative effort by Christine Schmücker and Nöle Giulini in form of a book that describes how the deep immersion into meditative self-inquiry and the artistic process became an every-day spiritual practice for me. It can be ordered here:
https://thepracticeofwelcoming.net/schatzhuterin
Very early on I became aware that the emperor of art does not actually wear new clothes but walks the streets naked.
I am drawn to that which is overlooked, avoided or forgotten, dismissed, that which is considered wrong, disturbing, flawed or dirty.
What seemed the most unlikely material was just right for me. So it became my artistic and spiritual calling to find and welcome the gold in the straw and the straw in the gold.
How close can I get to the formless, how little material can I use and still represent something?
How close can I get to nothingness- call it the source- from where everything emerges?
These were and are my questions to a world that covers up breathing aliveness with endless prescriptions, quoting itself over and over again, avoiding and pasting over that which trembles and shimmers and cannot be structured, named or controlled.
For example, I realized that the holes in my socks are the “border guards of matter”. Like angels in the “Hol(e)y Sock” series, they would radiate “a perfection made of imperfection”:
“The strangest thing about a hole is its edge. It still belongs to the something, but continuously looks into nothing, a border guard of matter.” (Kurt Tucholsky)
Everything that longs for dissolution or speaks of darkness interests me:
The yellowed white of worn-out underpants, dried banana peels, fruit and vegetables that are decomposing, rabbit droppings, old newspapers, and finally the Kombucha membrane, which is still alive even when dried.
Fascinated by this borderline state between here and there – the Either/Or – that defines everything as separate, I turn toward those aspects of our lives that we sweep under the carpet or prefer to turn our backs on.
Welcoming as a way of life is a process of inclusion. It means exchanging “OR” for “AND”.
This is where the treasure lies hidden.