Painted Medicine by Dustin Tidwell

Light Warrior

   Hello this is Dustin Tidwell.  I wanted to explain another piece I've done for Painted Medicine.  This is a piece that I called "Light Warrior. " I'm doing a lot of work with the feminine image, divine female, the curvature of the body as well as the internal spirit.  I personally feel females overall are a lot more at peace and more gentle than  the male part of the  human race.  In trying to embody that concept, I have been doing a lot of figures of females nude & dressed, in  positive or powerful poses or in a position of freedom.

     In this image I have a lady who sitting in, what I view as the medicine wheel.  In the Image, It's not circular and broken into four quadrants, but the Native American medicine wheel is a symbol that I guess I resonate to.  It is a Circle with white to the north, yellow to the east, red to the south and black to the west.

      In this image she's basically sitting in the medicine wheel.  If you're looking at a a map where the East is to her back, she's in the sunrise and blowing through her hair. Her hair is even changing into the sunrise. Her left hand is reaching up into the white. So she's reaching up into the white part of the medicine wheel, which in my belief system is represented by the nighttime/dream-state that we go into every evening. She's sitting on the red, the plane that we live in, in this reality, where we  live day-to-day, from the time we wake until the time we sleep.  In the native american medicine wheel, that's represented by the color red.  If you think red, red is a color of hot, it's heat, it's lessons.  It's not always beautiful. That's where she sitting in a grounded position.

      In front of her are two things.  There is the earth, if you will, or an earth-like image kind of in front of her.  But, she is detached from that.  She is not necessarily,  just on the earth plane. In front of hers is also the color represented by the setting sun or black in the Native American medicine wheel, to the west. And so she's looking at it,  arms up representing  "I'm good, I'm good".

      She's a warrior of the light. The way I explain Warrior of the Light is somebody who is maybe not always positive, but attempting to bring a better piece of love, understanding, oneness, and cooperation to this world.  In this world that is divided into  divisiveness, has been broken apart by war,  race, religion,  wealth and all the other fricking things you could break this world up into; she's not part of it. She is sitting back going, "I love you all and ill sit here in the sun." 

I hope you enjoy.

peace and love

dustin