Does Mother Nature Influence Us In Subtle Ways

I do believe she has her favourites, she surely has her ways.

Listen carefully when Mother Nature gives you ideas.

I have been asked from time to time about whom should receive credit for the Kasatochi volcano art I frequently use (as seen in this post). I recently responded to one person on the origin of that piece of art as follows.

It’s not a new idea, Mother Nature has been dusting her ocean pastures forever…

The credit for the Kasatochi volcano ocean miracle image is due to a number of its creators. The image first came to me in a cold winter’s night dream between Christmas and New Years during which I awoke in the middle of the night driven to write down the poem that became the song 40 Salmon Can’t Be Wrong.  Along with the words had come the image of that Alaska volcano miracle.

The image of the Kasatochi Volcano Miracle, as seen in our 40 Million Salmon Can’t Be Wrong concert, was painted by famous Canadian First Nations artist Roy Henry Vickers. Roy traveled down from Northern British Columbia to meet as we planned a concert. I picked Roy up from the airport and driving home I told him the story of the Kasatochi miracle of the 40 million salmon. Later he sent this image saying he was smitten with the image that had formed in his mind’s eye. Click for the concert video.

Some might choose to call this a vision. It was and always will be a vivid image in my mind’s eye. I initially sketched it in a form not very different from this presentation, but not being a practicing artist, I soon spoke with a close friend and artist. As I told the story and described the image in my mind, she also fell in love with the picture from my dream. In conversation, she helped me with the telling of the story and the visualization, but alas she did not have time to help as an artist to put the image in its greater glory onto paper or canvas.

Next hired was a famous Vancouver artist/illustrator to help me improve on it. He was/is a major artist and illustrator in Vancouver and works a lot of the federal fisheries. We met a couple of times and we developed sketches. But alas when some of the government people, his major source of income, got wind he was working on a commissioned piece of art for me on this topic, they threatened to not allow him to continue as an artist for the government if he stayed working with me. He of course chose the bigger client.

Then another artist was found, Leanne Hodges who completed the work in this latest and wonderful iteration. My life-long friend Holly Arntzen (and her partner Kevin) who’d helped me write and put to music the salmon song and I commissioned Leanne to do this painting of my vision at a large size in acrylic. Leanne was in an especially difficult financial and emotional bind at the time and it took her most of a year to complete the painting. It’s beautiful. My thanks forever to Leanne who added her heart and soul into this painting.

Its credit goes to Mother Nature who choose to speak to me in a dream on cold winter’s night.

So the moral of this story is that we should not underestimate how Mother Nature involves herself in taking care of her blue planet.