Gaia the Earth Goddess

During the late 80s I hung out with a community of esotericists, pagans, and Grateful Dead fans. It sounds more hip than it was, since all of these people were also either graduate students or workers in high tech or other upper-echelon jobs, and they lived in suburbs or cities, not in hippie communes. These folks inspired a lot of art from me, some of which was good and some of which was not. This is one of the better ones, though the photo isn't very clear. It's based on a real person, who I used as a model many times. She had the face of a Renaissance Italian Madonna, and golden fluffy hair. She also had a big blue dress which was just right for many Goddess or Marian concepts. I took many photographs of her in that dress, storing up image stock for whatever Virgin Mary or Earth Goddess I would do in the future.

This is one of the paintings which came of that photo session. In this, she is Gaia the Earth Mother, taking care of planets and an idyllic Earth. The child and the cat in this image didn't exist. I put them there to suggest a family which she might have in years to come. After exhibiting the picture, I gave it to her and her husband. I suppose they still have it. I lost contact with all of these folk over the years, though I know that my model went on to have two children, who looked nothing like the child in this picture. They still live near me in Northern Virginia, but I haven't seen them in more than fifteen years.

"Gaia, the Earth Goddess" is gouache on Strathmore bristol board, 13" x 15", January 1988.