The Garden Path

"Do I lead you up the Garden Path?"

Part 2, Chapter 3 of Insectual

Do I lead you up the Garden Path (page 126)

The doctor is carrying many books. The titles are not visible, but might read like “Personal History”, “History of the Ancestors”, “The Relationship Trap”, “Buried Talents” and “Awakening in the 21^st Century”.
 

The hill is steep.  She is picking up the books that the doctor drops to the ground.  The job is arduous, but she is the collector of information.  The more she advances in therapy, the more inner knowledge she is gaining.  In therapy, the mind is an archaeological site and if she persists she might find buried surprises: Pleasurable ones? Not so pleasurable ones?? She cannot allow herself to be afraid.  Beauty, represented by the flowers, is surrounding her.



 

 

 

 



Walk to school

"Walk to school is long and tiring."

 

Part 2, Chapter 2 of Insectual

 

March to School, (page 123)

 

“Blah”, I thought, “skip it. There is nothing to say about this image.” But my mind did not agree. And off I went on a spiralling journey. What does this path remind me off? A ribbon, a river, intestines, a snake, a thread, an umbilical cord, a link between heaven and earth. The end of a note. I felt music stretch like this path through my nightly home.

Being a Doll

"He has become redundant"

 

Part 2, chapter 1 of Insectual

 

Being a Doll 

He lost his home, but an impression is left, see the empty space where his home was standing. She grabbed the home, put it into her lap, as if it was one of her babies. The house was hers now.

''Perhaps I can distract him.''

Part 1, chapter 26 of Insectual

 

                               Night of Delirium, page 110


He carries a machete. She open her arms wide. She is wearing a kimono. Does she invite him to have sex in order to save her life? We have to imagine what might happen. She transforms herself into a butterfly and now the path away from harm is wide open.  

“Life is like a butterfly. It flies away and makes me cry.”

 

This is the last chapter of Part 1, “Marriage in Congo.” In future I will add more colourful images. 



Towards a better world.

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy New Year 2017



Mandala in the forest, 16 x 20" (41 x 51 cm) (c) Barbara Sala

 

 

Horse, rabbits, cat and lion

At the feet of Mother Earth.

 

Hermit at the riverbank

Shedding light on crystal ball

Dangling from an angel's hand.

 

Boat of fishermen,

Damaged by a fallen tree,

Now is carried by loving dolphin

Over the water.

 

Filled with flowers is this forest:

Happy days with health and kindness

Are the wishes for this year.  (B. Sala)

 

 

Part 1, Chapter 25, Hostages in a friendly land

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Show no Fear."

 

Part 1, Chapter 25

 

Hostages in a friendly land (page 107 of  250)

 

You, who do not know the story, in seeing this picture what do you see? Perhaps that Maya is a "being of light" who walks through a row of ghostlike soldiers. She has made herself invisible to the human eye and at the same time she made her enemy invisible as well.

What is Insectual about.

 

 What is Insectual about by Ann Diamond, author

Barbara is a prolific German-born Montreal painter and writer whose work has been shown internationally. 

Her novel (fictionalized autobiography) INSECTUAL is a fascinating colourful spellbinding gripping account of a life lived on three continents spanning the second world war in Nazi Germany and the Belgian Congo at the height of its bloody civil war. 

Arriving in Montreal as a married woman with two children, Maya (the heroine) begins an Odyssey of self-exploration that leads her to unravel the secrets of her childhood as the daughter of a Luftwaffe pilot as Germany was being defeated. 

Her brilliant gifted therapist becomes the focus of her quest to revive her frozen sexuality lying dormant even after years of marriage to a sex addict. This deep contradiction fuels her artistic evolution and also brings her to the brink of psychotic breakdown.

This is a story of healing through art and self-analysis, but also a remarkable journey into the jungles and war zones of the human – and particularly female – spirit coming into conflict with a patriarchal reality that offers no real hope and appears to be collapsing.

INSECTUAL is a brave and terrifying page-turner of a memoir that deserves to be read by many readers. Barbara Sala is her own publisher, but this book is highly marketable to a wide audience. 

Inside the Hospital, Part 1, Chapter 23

!FREE GIVEAWAY FREE !

 

I original illustration of this book when you purchase Insectual from Amazon and post your review on Amazon. Please send me your selection of the image you would like to have, your email address and your Amazon receipt.  The size of the image is  5 x 7 inches or 13 x 18 cm and the medium ink and charcoal on acid free paper.  Thanks.

 

Testicles big as Light Bulbs.

 

Part 1, Chapter 23

 

Inside the Hospital  (page 102)

     I do not see any symbolism in this drawing, but stark reality. I made the sketch from a photo that I took in 1966 when I visited this village. The people let me take pictures, even invited me to take them. Understandably they were desperate and hungry. The U.N. Team distributed milk and other foods.

Not many babies are travelling, Part 1, Chapter 21

"Not many babies are travelling these days."

Part 1, Chapter 21, page 96

Emergency

Curiously, the soldiers are inspecting the baby on the tarmac of the Kindu airport. That is history. But in my symbolic world, these soldiers or warriors are saluting the inner child, our creative energy, our inner fountain of love. I am giving to each warrior a name like sorrow, pain, jealousy, envy, vanity, guilt, hate, regrets, righteousness. They are surrounding the baby. They want to be touched by its love in order to be healed, since they are hurting. The warriors are the negative aspects that arise in us and are parts of our psyche that want to be  made whole.

Amedea, Part 1 Chapter 20

"A desired pregnancy"

Amedea page 92

This is Maya’s second birth. Her pregnancy is desired and she feels happy. Her baby is floating in her womb and her hand seems to reassure the baby that she is there and loves it. Will it be a boy or a girl? Her belly is as round as the earth. One side lies in darkness, the other is bathed in light. Her breasts are full: Is Mother Earth desiring to be fed as well. A Congolese family is looking on. Maya got married to have her own family. She needs this stability in her adventurous and agitated life.

Nicholas, Part 1 Chapter 19

"Giving Birth in the Congo"

Part 1 Chapter 19 

Nicholas, Page 90

Maya is giving birth to her first child. Between her legs, out of the dark womb, the head emerges. Our human body is also called the temple of our soul. At the entry of the temple of Luxor in Egypt, the visitor is flanked by two enormous feet. I crowned the mother: she is the birth channel for humanity to enter our physical world. She is surrounded by 5 straw huts. In checking out the symbolic meaning of the number 5, I discovered that this is the number of marriage and stability. Maya married to have some stability in her life. It also means expansion, i.e. breaking through the wall of the square which is number 4 and expand into the surrounding world. 

Part 1 Chapter 17

Thoughts had to be harnessed like horses.

Part 1 Chapter 17

Fantasies  (page 81)

The inner chatter in our brains is overwhelming and creates part of our suffering. Where does this all come from? The experts say this chatter comes from outside of us. These are the constant repetitions, justifications, explanations of what we have learned, analyzed, experienced, seen, felt and stored in our brain.

There are ways of breaking this flow. We have to expose ourselves to positive  vibrations. When I was younger I recited poetry  and that cooled down my inner tortured world.  But I was never free of the darkness. Today  I use the conscious breath that interrupts the flow of thoughts.

So Maya harnesses her thoughts like horses. With her brain power she now controls her world. In the picture the tree is bending and the flowers are drooping to the ground under her will power.  

www.amazon.ca or www.amazon.com;  www.goodreads.com/barbarasala

 

 

 

You are cordially invited to this exhibition in the Quebec Eastern Townships in Coaticook at the Musee Beaulne. The exhibition runs from May 8th to July 3rd, 2016. The vernissage takes place on May 15, from 2:00 to 4:00 pm. I will be there.

 

 Naïve Art Door to your Heart

 

You can find on page 177 of my book Insectual the same image in black and white. The painting in acrylics and oil on canvas was inspired by this small sketch. The painting's size is 22 x 28 inches or 56 x 71 cm.

 

Man in velvet flower Coat.

 

Happy Mother's Day

Mother of Twins, (c) B. Sala  18 x 24", collage,

 acrylic on masonite

 

 

Part I Chapter 16

I buried the "Devil"

Burying the "Devil"

 

Part 1 Chapter 16

 

She is determined. She is strong. The “Devil” feeling is preventing her from being happy. While sitting in the shade on a rock and watching people push the car out of the sand, she buries the “Devil” into the sand.

As you can see, he is now trapped between the rock and the earth. Her physical brain has become her rock, a strong rock. The repressed “Devil” has no more power over her - so she is convinced - but that doesn’t mean that he is not alive. As his origins are not understood, he is just sinking into her unconscious and now hiding in every cell of her being.  She might have even projected him onto Lorenzo. But for now there is no more suffering. She is proud of her conquest.

 

Mandala of the "Devil"

 

Review by Rosie Malezer for Readers' Favorite: 5 Stars *****

The title and cover art of INSECTUAL (The Secret of the Black Butterfly) by Barbara Sala intrigued me. It details the life of Maya – a German woman who describes intimacy and sex as ‘the devil’ – yet has no problems falling in love. After an unwanted pregnancy and abortion, Maya meets and marries Lorenzo, an Italian man who finds Maya enchanting. Due to complications with the birth of her second child with Lorenzo, Maya and the baby are rushed to the hospital. After the birth, she is secreted away just moments before her city comes under fire. When Maya and Lorenzo are finally reunited, Lorenzo confesses his infidelities in a drunken stupor.

Therapy is recommended to Maya in the hopes that it will fix her loathing of sexual acts. Shortly after her therapy sessions commence, Maya realizes that she does not want to stay married to an unfaithful husband. After divorcing Lorenzo, Maya spends many years in therapy, discovering her real inner demons lie with her father who had molested and raped her as a child – traumatic memories which Maya had buried over the years. Most of Barbara Sala’s book INSECTUAL (The Secret of the Black Butterfly) consists of Maya’s therapy sessions, her thoughts, her fears, her dreams and what she chooses to tell her therapist.

It is very well written throughout and the illustrations at the beginning of each segment of the book are quite clever, painting a very clear picture of what Maya is thinking. While the book was very difficult to read in some places due to the content, I am grateful to have read it, as it teaches one of the most incredible lessons a person can learn in life: forgiveness.