ABOUT THE ART

The drawing on the cover was done by Paul Levy (as were the two pencil drawings on this page and this page ). The way this cover drawing emerged illustrates how the dreaming process works. The publisher and I were collaboratively co-dreaming, trying to decide on a cover together. For one reason or another all of our ideas for the cover weren’t working, and then word came down that we had twenty-four hours to decide on the final image of the cover. Up until this point, I had been trying to describe to other artists my vision of what I wanted so that they could make the cover for me. This impending deadline catapulted me over my edge, however, and I stayed up all night and did the drawing that is now on the cover. Feeling as if I had “objectified” and captured wetiko’s essence in the image, it was as if I had performed some sort of exorcism, as I felt something within me had become liberated through the act of creating the drawing. In doing the drawing, I knew without a shadow of a doubt that I had “found” the cover for the book, or to say it differently, the cover of the book had found me.

From the dreaming point of view, in trying to have someone else incarnate my vision, it was as if I was not fully connected with, and therefore had been projecting outside of myself, my “inner artist” onto others. The deadline increased the pressure in the alchemical vessel such that I was able to withdraw my projection, however, and step into the creative artist living inside me. This is the way dreaming works: if in a given moment we are not fully embodying a part of ourselves, just as in a dream, we project it outside of ourselves, and then it becomes a question of whether or not we recognize the projection as our own. Thankfully, in my case, my waking dream was conspiring to have me own my projection, become more intimately acquainted with my own creativity, and do the drawing myself.

Regarding the self-portrait on this page , this was the first drawing I did after recovering from the fever that I had for a year (I talk about this in the Afterword ). I had originally titled this drawing Self-Portrait after Long Illness , but changed the title after realizing that the drawing was produced after I was introduced to the spirit of wetiko. In this drawing I clearly remember that in searching for the image, I didn’t know what I wanted, but I knew what I didn’t want—I kept on erasing, till I “found” the final image, as if I had been looking for it all along. This drawing really expresses how I was feeling at that point in my life. Interestingly, at the time this was the best self-portrait I had ever done.

My drawing on this page , titled Padmasambhava , was done as a way of clarifying my visualization of this deity that I had been working on as part of my Tibetan Buddhist practice. Instead of drawing it in the traditional way, with very precise proportions and classical composition, I just imagined that Padmasambhava was sitting in front of me, and as an artist, I was simply trying to do a portrait of what I was seeing.

The vampire squid on this page was done by Luke Brown, who is an intrepid psychonautical explorer, part of a new generation of visionaries who are redefining the templates of art as we know it. His creative output speaks of the spiritual mysteries in the human imagination. His work is inspired by mystical experiences, dreams, medicine journeys, and channeled lucid dialogues with the source of creativity itself. Much of his work emerges from a graceful synthesis of digital and painting mediums. Luke is constantly redefining his style as a spiritual medium for growth. His intent is to map his hyperspatial experiences with the utmost accuracy, using whatever medium seems best suited for the moment, as a living form of multidimensional cartography. Luke Brown’s website can be found at spectraleyes.com .