This is the second round of meditative sketch collaging that I have done for my personal project. I decided to spent a little more time focusing on the meditative aspect of this practice, so I made a playlist of calming music and rented out a quiet study room in the library so I could focus all my energy on my art. Surprisingly, this collage came out much less unified than my last one, which was interconnected with a flow of life energy symbolized by the flowers present in nearly every sketch in the collage.

The disunity in this collage is probably due to my personal conflict with the material that I was analyzing. For this collage session, I set my intention to focus on expressing my interpretation of Kurlansky’s Nonviolence: The History of a Dangerous Idea. I noticed I had a very strong reaction to his depiction of Christianity, especially in its history of being manipulated by state powers and being brokered as political leverage. Many of my sketches show typical symbols of institutionalized power controlling images Christianity or censoring/shaping a faith to fit their agenda. This was difficult for me as I am uncomfortable seeing my religion depicted in this way in Kurlansky’s text, but found a release in expressing this discomfort through art and claiming ownership over my own interpretation of his claims. I genuinely do feel more at peace with the text after this particular session.