“As the artist of your own story, when your burden becomes too much to carry, lift your arms like branches upward from your trunk and open your hands toward the sky. Reach for the listening heavens.”
— Linda Frimer
Symbols
The moon represents the in-dwelling presence of the feminine of the Creator, the Shekinah, here on earth. Since earliest times, humanity has held a fascination with the moon. Its lunar cycles mark time for ancient people and mark a woman’s monthly cycle. The moon also symbolizes the Jewish people whose glory will shine with the healing of our world and messianic times. The waning of the moon symbolizes that the earth is not yet healed and our purpose is repair of our sacred earth and each other.
Many of my paintings contain a central pathway. In Hebrew, pathway is netiviot. Through our lifetime, we carve two pathways. One, a universal shared pathway in our natural world, with shared with others in cultural and community awareness. The other is a personal journey unknown even to us, discovered in the process of living. This we carve in our unique individual journey through creation, clearing our way through the forest of existence, marking our path, finding our meaning.
A symbol of purity, vulnerability, innocence and modesty. Like all birds, the dove represents the soul striving toward the Creator. Its upward movement is indicative of striving to grow. The gentlest of birds, it is hope in the future – as it was the dove that returned with an olive branch in her beak after the biblical flood.
I draw the dove every day in my journal. Often, I embellish with large curving wings and leaves and petals, roses, sunflowers, evergreens and spirals.
Trees are vertical connector between heaven and earth, symbolic of growth, grounded in earth and reaching toward the sky. In ancient days, trees were worshiped as living spirits. There were sacred groves of respite and sanctuary.
The tree is symbolic of striving, of the force of life, the forest, a place of reception, rejecting no-one and nothing.
There are two ways to love and honour creation. One is through our good deeds in the midst of humanity. And the other is in our reverence and care for our natural world.
A symbol of hope, growth, renewal, potential, achievement and perfection, the flower is often used as an ornamental motif by all cultures and is a religious symbol throughout the world because of its meaning of love and honouring. The fragrance, beauty and colour of flowers offer inspiration.
For me, flowers are an offering of energy, colour, and light. They symbolize the beauty in life and offer hope in the future. In my paintings, irises often symbolize light and the sunflower symbolizes the sun and courage.
“Linda wants us to appreciate the connections among all people, the connections that animate the natural world, the connections between humanity and nature, the connections that people create through compassion, empathy and caretaking of each other and the earth, the connections we create when we repair what has been broken and the connections we create through art—for the language of art is universal.”
—Eric Davis Special Advisor to the President, University of the Fraser Valley and Deanna Reder Chair, Department of Indigenous Studies, Simon Fraser University