Mythical Painting

 Been working in the studio lately and it feels good. Three of the latest:

Dragon Smoke, acrylic on canvas, 18" by "24

Dracula's Hall, acrylic on canvas

Mermaid's Sky, acrylic on board

A Train, Jeff Goldblum and an Alien Assignment

 Okay dreaming mind is visiting alien motifs again. This time. . .

I'm given a writing assignment in class. A combination of work/school. The assignment: describe yourself if you were an ET. What do you look like, what can you do, etc. I write a good two or three pages before I realize I haven't yet described what I look like as an alien. Just that I am an alien, and flying at night above a train, looking for Jeff Goldblum. I find him! He's alone in a car. Soft yellow light. A Edward Hopper painting feel.  My heart is a-flutter. Jeff Goldblum! I found him at last. Sigh. 

I remember now that I am to describe myself as an alien. However, I am really truly an alien, this is really happening, and the writing assignment is the dream, the unreal part. As an ET, I am winged. Blues and greens. Something of a flying mermaid fairy being. I realize I should change into human form so I don't scare off Jeff Goldblum. Wouldn't want to startle the poor man.

Edward Hopper

Everything Here All At Once

 I'm just going to throw it all out here. I have many blogs, some which I can't access due to massive Google/Blogger fuck ups. And after fifteen years or more of blogging I have no idea what passwords were when where... 

So the Orange Orb is all about UFOs. The things themselves, cases old and new, my own experiences, my friends, my armchair research, my rants,UFO Land,  ghosts, aliens, crytpids, and all manner of Fortean weirdness. Always.

But also art and poetry and writing and who the hell knows. Stay tuned. Please. Thanks.

The Witchy Magick Season: Art, BVM and Apparitions

 My art groove is back. Rearranged my paranormal library; here's my Marian Apparition shelf. 

I'm keeping my Doreen Virtue Mary Oracle deck, even though Virtue's turned against the occult and became born again, denouncing her past heathen pagan ways. I could have sworn I had more books on BVM apparitions.

Years ago I put together a free PDF e-book on Mary as Trickster on Lulu.com. You can download it here.

Speaking of apparitions, I recently completed this:

Apparition, acrylic and ink on canvas, 18" by 20"

Back to the Marian apparitions topic, I did this collage about a year ago:

Dollhouse People, digital collage

The collage was created by using a photograph of a pasture where I saw a dollhouse just sitting there in the middle of nowhere. I added the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, then played with the color on the computer.

And this of the Blessed Mary, done about a year ago:

UFO Mary, oil pastel on paper

I have a blog titled UFO-Mary, but due to Google-Blogspot password insanity, I can't access the blog.  Very frustrating! 

Sinister Spirit, acrylic on masonite, James Rich

This painting was done by my husband. I had posted it at my UFO-Mary blog. As someone commented, it has a Buddha like feeling. Jim and I both thought it looked like an abstracted goddess or BVM figure.

Samhain Dance, acrylic and ink on canvas, Regan Lee

I painted Samhain Dance last month, October, the witchy season. 

World Gone Mad: Destroying Art

Tim Binnal at Coast to Coast has a link to this story: Video: Man Destroys $5 Million in Ancient Artifacts Following Fight with Girlfriend | Coast to Coast AM

A highly disgruntled boyfriend, who was "mad at his girl," went crazy and vandalized ancient artifacts.

That's not all in this Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World: a man, who disguised himself as an old

woman in a wheelchair, threw a pie at the Mona Lisa.

At this point, all we can say is: WTFF?!

Individuals angry, mad, frustrated at whatever, attack works of art. Of history. Of great import to cultures. 

Better than shooting up an elementary school and murdering children and adults.

The Case of the Curious Dollhouse

 Which remains unsolved.

I found this photograph as I was working the book room we're clearing out. It was near an envelope from the U of O, Folklore Department. I majored in folklore there; and yard art, outsider art was an interest of mine, still is. So I know I spent a lot of time taking pictures of yard art, things I found along the way, colorful mailboxes and folk art, especially religious or spiritual inspired folk, or outsider art. (The two; folk and outsider, are not necessarily the same thing.) In fact, the photo was near an envelope full of photos I took at the Saturday Market, where a woman who went by the name of Sister Bear decorated holy cards and night lights of Jesus and Mary.

I have no memory of taking this photo though. None. What an odd thing to find; a dollhouse in the middle of a pasture. Just sitting there. The area looks to be in the Lorane area, a rural area right outside of town, an area I drove through all the time and still do.

This will make a very neat mixed media, collage piece! 

This Ain't No Party: Covid

 I can't shake it. Still have the Covid Virus Variant What Fresh Hell Is This on my mind. A year or so ago, I was doing tons of Covid related drawings and paintings. Even cartoons. Dozens. Also haiku and micro poetry. Then it stopped. We still had Covid of course, but my need to express my anxiety and obserevations ceased. 

Until now. Suddenly, I have found myself obsessively drawing a lot of Covid drawings again. If you scroll down you'll see a few posts where I've commented on my feelings surrounding the virus as well as some drawings.

And now,  one of my sisters has Covid. Despite her being vaccinated and a booster and wearing a mask. She's okay, overall. Still, it's hard. Isolated in her place. Feeling . . . weird. Etc.

Damn it.

Damn it!

Here are two more recent drawings:

This Ain't No Party, ink and marker on paper, Regan Lee 2022

Covid Cloud, ink and marker on paper, Regan Lee, 2022

The Mask-less and My Passive Aggressive Wimp-Out

 It happened. Today in the West Eugene post office, woman in front of me, no mask. None. She was mask-less. I was behind her, and said "Some of us think we're too good to wear a mask," which was both lame (clearly my inner Dorothy Parker was sleeping) and passive aggressive. Since I said it kind of sort of not so loud. 

I glared at her. From behind her of course. Still, maybe she felt my rays of rage. The clerk didn't say anything to her.

When I got up to the counter, I asked if there was a post office policy about wearing masks. She said they weren't allowed to deny services to anyone. She agreed the woman without the mask was a jerk. She said that sometimes she'll say to a customer "You forgot your mask," and the responses vary, from a shrug and an "I know," to a "What are. ya gonna do about it?" I told her I feel bad for her and the other postal employees (just like store employees and educators, etc.) who have to wear masks for the whole damn day. And yet someone who comes into the post office for ten minutes can't be bothered to wear a mask. 

Also, there was a senior citizen hippie (hey, no judgement, I'm a senior citizen hippie) who was donning the "dick nose" mask. You know, where the mask is on the face, but pulled down over the nose. But he was further back in line and I wasn't going to get into a long distance shouting match in the post office.

I should have said something to the woman directly. Should I have? People are crazy and filled with rage these days.  I didn't want to end up on a You Tube video of crazy lady in the post office attacks mask less woman. Who's the Karen here? (not me!) I didn't want this woman to pull out the scissors she had in her pocket, in her attempts to protect herself against my confronting her. Okay, a little dramatic maybe.  I doubt she would have reacted that way. 

But her in your face -- literally -- statement of not wearing a mask was just so damn insulting. No one likes wearing a mask. I don't. At all. Too bad. I don't want to get sick, I don't want to get others sick. And it's really rude to not wear a mask for ten minutes while you're in a store or other public place where the employees have to wear a mask for up to eight hours, often more. 

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I did two more Covid drawings since yesterday's post. In that post, I commented that drawings with the word Covid alert the algorithms on social media, as well as some group moderators. (One art group I belong to has, in its rules, "no Covid related work," what and why?) So I call this drawing Invasion of the Button People:

Invasion of the People, ink, marker on paper, Regan Lee 2022

Variants, ink, marker on paper, Regan Lee 2022

"No Covid Work Accepted"

 Not much to report; no pithy snarky comments on the current state of things in UFO Land. (I mean, I could, but I won't. At least not now.)

But, our global lives being turned inside out due to Covid continue to be turned inside out, and sideways, and back in/out again. People are tired, nuts, full of rage and ignorance. 

I'm tired. We're all tired. Fed up. Sad. Depressed. But . . . that is our new reality. 

Anyway, one of the artist groups I belong to on Facebook rejected my drawing:

Still Here: Covid 2022, ink, marker on paper

It was rejected because the group rules state "No Covid related material." I didn't read the rules, which is a bit hypocritical -- though I prefer lazy -- since I run several groups myself. It's their right to have any rules they want. But I just found it such an odd reaction. 

I'm not making any political statement. Covid is still here. Expressing our angst, outrage, fear, and fatigue through artistic methods is a healthy way to deal with it all.  Is the thinking that, by simply ignoring the existence of Covid, it will go away? Is there some assumed political agenda embedded in the title, the drawing? What if I titled the drawing "Bugs," or something?  Do we now have to disguise Covid themed work in order not to ... what? Offend? Disturb? Anger? 

Art and the X-Files

 I've been bingeing on X-Files lately. A feast! I've also been going through many of my art books, seeking inspiration. And found, to my surprise, The Art of the X-Files. Great find but have no memory of how I came to own this book. I don't remember, nor does my husband. Nothing mysterious here; no doubt, during my days as a folklore UFO nerd at the U of O, I purchased the book. Maybe it was a gift. Either way, nice discovery!

Covid Nightmares

Computer manipulated oil pastel on gray paper: Covid Nightmares

 It's taken me a good long year or more to really feel the depression and anxiety surrounding Covid. 

Two years ago in March, a few days before my birthday, I came home from the elementary school where I worked as an Instructional Assistant in the Title 1 program. And I never came back. Covid had just hit, and schools were shutting down, moving on to distance learning, etc. I had planned to retire that year and had just started that process. I was to finish out my contract until June, so, I did on line teaching until then. Also, we cancelled our annual It's Regan's Birthday Bash on the Oregon Coast in Yachats. Every year, forever, we went to the coastal town of Yachats to celebrate my birthday. Not that year. 

It was crazy, frustrating, and very strange. Laptops loaned to me from the district didn't work, learning the brand new systems was definitely a challenge, taking on line courses to justify my salary were boring and hard, and, seemed pointless since I was retiring. But I got through it.  (The challenges for certified teachers and the little kids were much harder.)

I don't mind wearing masks, I was vaccinated and got my booster. I wash my hands, take zinc and other supplements. The first year was okay. The second year, a bit harder. I miss visiting with friends. 

And lately, I realize it's really hit hard. I still mind the whole mask thing, but the paranoia has seeped into my subconscious. I don't feel comfortable meeting friends in public places. When I do, it's that little window in between Covid variants. One week it's safe, the next, not. Numbers of patients with Covid who are hospitalized go up, and, deaths. Medical staff shortages. Confusing data from the CDC and other organizations. Everywhere it seems a lot of people -- far too many! -- are behaving as if Covid is over, or, not so bad. Crowds at football games without masks, sitting right next to each other.

Also, as strange as it is to acknowledge, our ages no doubt have something to do with my anxieties. I'm in my late sixties, my husband in his seventies. We have all kinds of health issues (strokes, heart attacks, chronic asthma, and more...

So, hating the fact we're leery and a bit paranoid, we are, nonetheless. . . leery and paranoid.

Meanwhile, I feel guilty for not socializing, while others do without a care. I can't help but feel despair and anger at people's stupidity. And I am angry and also despair at the systems in charge, because they know what needs to be done, and it isn't getting done. It never will get done. That's what systems do. They gaslight us. They intentionally do the most blatant topsy turvy acts of absurdity.  

Covid Nightmare: "Bleh", oil pastel on gray paper, Regan Lee 2022

And now Covid has infected my dreams. I have dreams I walk into a store without a mask, and I'm horrified that I forgot. Or that others are not wearing masks, and we get into a fight. The past week, I've had two dreams where I had a bad case of Covid. I woke up very scared.

I tried to interpret the feeling those dreams gave me in this piece. But it was "blah." I manipulated the oil pastel on the computer, and was surprised at how this image gives a pretty good idea of what I'm feeling. 

Covid Nightmares. Indeed. The only thing I can say is that we need to be patient with each other and take care of ourselves. Such a simple thought, but hard to do. Especially now.

Retirement, Work Dreams, Drums, and the Children

 I retired from working in the education field for twenty -two months, after working in education for over thirty five years. And since then, I've had dreams of working in education several times a week. The dreams don't stop.

They have changed, however.

I started off dreaming that I was at work, and ... well, as usual. Then, the dreams shifted. I would show up at work, but wasn't aware of my schedule. Then, I'd show up, but told I had to continue working until they figured things out. After that, I dreamt I was told by HR that I "owed" them time. I had to work for another three months or so until I paid off my debt. Sort of like a student loan deal.

Then, arrived at work doing my own thing, and no one seemed to know why I was there or what I was to be doing, including me. Then I 'd start questioning my involvement; do I get paid? I love what I do but if I don't get paid, and don't have a schedule of expectations ...

And sometimes my professors -- and here it gets to be really important, according to my non-objective interpretation -- from the Folkore program at the U of O would show up. I am all mixed up; do I teach 3rd grade, or go into the Folkore side of things?

Last night I had a dream where I arrive at the elementary school, okay, fine. Nice to be with the kids. But before I could get there, I hear drums. A drum circle! So wonderful. A great big huge drum circle! I want to join but, while I do have a drum (in Waking Life, I do, a dumbek) I don't know much about how to play. I really don't know anything about rhythm, beat, bass, etc. Just that I want to DRUM!

So I walk away from the school, and go off in search of the drum.

Clearly, these dreams are telling me that I can still, somehow, in some way, work with kids, but in a new way. A new path. I just have to figure it out. Create a bridge between my own creative self with the children. Because I miss the children.

I really miss the children!

But not the bullshit bureaucracy, crazy parents, and politics.

Art Blog

 I occasionally post my artwork  with UFO and related themes here on the Orb. I've started a blog that shows all kinds of art work, not just UFO themed. Take a look, and comments are welcome. Thanks!

Regan Lee: Art Blog.

Filippo Morghen's Fantastical Visions of Lunar Life (1776)

 I've been exploring the Public Domain Review site, looking for images for my digital collages. There is a lot of interesting information and illustrations going back to the 1600s. Simply fascinating! 

Filippo Morghen's Fantastical Visions of Lunar Life (1776)

Mixed Media : "Night City Orbs"

 Yes, as always, orange orbs on the brain.

I call this "Night City Orbs." 11" by 14" on board.

This is a mixed media piece. I collaged newspaper to a gesso background, then sand papered the surface, leaving some of the paper. Then I applied in thin washes acrylic and metallics.

Vintage Exploration

 Busy playing in the studio with mixed media pieces and collage. Here's a collage inspired by half-watching several episodes of Ancient Aliens recently:

Vintage Exploration, paper, liquid watercolor, acrylic, garnet texture paste on canvas, 10" x 8"

Gray Alien Geisha Collage

Inspired my by dream encounter, years ago right after seeing the orange orb, of the tall white Insectoid-gray wearing a Geisha wig inside the ship. 

I've been busy with my mixed media work. Little of it has to do with the realm of the strange, but I created this digital collage awhile ago.

Two Pieces: Mothy Owl and Reptilians in the Classroom

 The other day, I posted about my failure regarding a piece I was working on about the orange orb. (You know, that orange orb.)

But I also feel pretty good about other pieces, including these two, that have a slight weirdness vibe.

Like this one: "Mothy Owl" collage, paper and watercolor on canvas board.

'Mothy Owl,' collage. Paper, watercolor on canvas board, Regan Lee 2021

And this one, a digital collage about our Reptilian friends:

'Mrs. Englebeery's Limited Career,' digital collage, Regan Lee 2021

UFOs: Graphic Matrix Webby Things

UFO Geo Scan, oil pastel on black paper, Regan Lee 2021

 Dream last night:

I'm standing outside my house, at night. Looking up at the sky. A voice over -- male -- from some podcast. I hear him. He talks about "orange orbs" and UFOs in general. Then, in the sky, I see colorful graph like formations appearing. Sort of like stationary fireworks. But not quite as spectacular. Very precise, geometric. Matrix type "drawings" in the sky.

With their appearance, I just know -- it is telepathically conveyed -- that UFOs are, often, ET, etc. But originate from a program. Geometry. Sacred geometry. And from that web, that mass of crossing lines and shapes, comes UFOs. And from the UFOs, all kinds of things. ETs, aliens, elementals, MIB, MIBLABS, what have you. 

 

 Recently, I was interviewed on Barbara Fisher's excellent podcast Six Degrees of John Keel. It was so much fun! We talked about many things, including tarot. As I said on the podcast, The Fool is my favorite tarot card. 

Of course, we also talked about orange orbs and all manner of weirdness.

Fisher and her co-host Morganna were fantastic hosts and I was honored to be on their program.

While you're over on the site, check out Fisher's art. I love her art; the use of mixed media, her vibrant colors, and her overall style. 

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THE FOOL, from Barbara Moore's Wonderland Tarot

I recently bought this deck. There are a few decks out there with Alice in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass themes. This deck was created by Barbara Moore.  

The Fool, from the Diamond Tarot

This deck is a Rider-Waite-Coleman deck but with vivid colors and psychedelic, colorful borders around each card. The deck is out of print and hard to find, and expensive! I've seen the deck offered at $300.00 and more. But I found the deck on eBay for about $30.00 after months of diligent watching. Today however, I saw the deck priced at $20.00.