I like to refresh the palate with photos I enjoyed taking years ago.
This revisit was an annual benefit for the Inspiration Corporation called One Inspired Evening. Their benefit art auction is the best local art social of the year.
Dorothy Perry is a Chicago portrait photographer. Contact her here.
My personal portraits focus on enjoyment & contemplation.
To that end, I remove canes, walkers, and aids for standing in the final framed portrait.
It is not a denial of their current age or health situation,
but a focus on a personal image that celebrates
a life-affirming vision of wholeness.
Always to your health, Dorothy
Be SEEN in photographs
that celebrate your family legacy
in all its’ lively, natural beauty.
I always see something extra,
even if that extra is YOU.
Questions on custom personal artwork starts here.
Professional artists love the opportunity for a ‘hands-on’ workshop with Sean Michael Felix, one of the best gold sign artists in the Midwest and the US.
Everyone’s creativity was enhanced by the beautiful setting and free flow of information: an urban ‘artist’s retreat’ experience.
Even the cats played their part to bring an ultra-relaxed vibe into the space.
These artisans in glass, tattooing, custom finishing, and sign-making come here to play, take these techniques to their businesses, and make them their own.
It feels great to be able to impart such knowledge and create artwork that adds much-needed beauty to this world.
Reach out to have a real artist experience. Feed your soul by creating something beautiful!
Sean Michael Felix Illumination Art & Design 26oo W North Ave. Chicago, Il 60647. Email: smfelixart@yahoo.com. Phone: 815-922-0959. Hours by appointment.
This jaunty derby
was an essential part
of this young man’s daily outfit
for school for a time.
We artistic types recognize
what courage it takes and what it costs
to be so different in this world.
This tiny picture fragment from long ago
becomes a testament to childhood’s beautiful, original spirit.
Dorothy Perry documents childhood at all ages. Contact her to photograph a loved one here. Consider yourself a loved one, too.
To woo the power full new Me
is my current raison d’etre.
Life, you can’t subdue me because I refuse to take your discipline too seriously.
When you try to hurt me, I laugh — and the laughter knows no pain.
I appreciate your joys wherever I find them;
your sorrows neither frighten nor discourage me,
for there is laughter in my soul.
Temporary defeat does not make me sad.
I simply set music to the words of defeat and turn it into a song.
Your tears are not for me, for I like laughter much better, and because I like it,
I use it as a substitute for grief and sorrow and pain and disappointment.
Life, you are a fickle trickster — don’t deny it.
You slipped the emotion of love into my heart
so that you might use it as a thorn with which to prick my soul —
but I learned to dodge your trap with laughter.
You tried to lure me with the desire for gold,
but I have fooled you by following the trail which leads to knowledge instead.
You induced me to build beautiful friendships —
then converted my friends to enemies so you may harden my heart,
but I sidestepped your figure on this by laughing off your attempts
and selecting new friends in my own way.
You caused men to cheat me at trade so I will become distrustful,
but I won again because I possess one precious asset which no man can steal —
it is the power to think my own thoughts and to be myself.
You threaten me with death, but to me death is nothing worse
than a long peaceful sleep, and sleep is the sweetest of human experiences
— excepting laughter.
You build a fire of hope in my heart, then sprinkle water on the flames,
but I can go you one better by rekindling the fire — and I laugh at you once more.
You have nothing that can lure me away from laughter,
and you are powerless to scare me into submission.
To a life of laughter, then, I raise my cup of cheer!
Laughing all the way, I celebrate your own Songs of Triumph in portrait form. Contact me here.
Names have been changed to protect the innocent.
My partner of five years decided to tell me
that the last five years were a total lie.
Imagine learning someone waited patiently for years
for the best moment to break your heart and trust in others.
A seismic jolt to the core of me
at a time I was happiness on two legs, ecstatic at my first solo show.
Now with the years and intimacies of memories colored and changed by betrayal,
No picture I see can be trusted.
But by deleting these photos on Facebook, I am also deleting the visible signs to me of my own moments and growth.
I decided to take my stand and reclaim the energy around my photographs.
Though he is in them, the ones I like are MINE,
and energy is always returned to me whenever I see it again.
In meditative renaming, I speak to remembering the high level of what I gained, evidenced, and celebrated,
reclaiming it for good, and returning it to me.
I call it my Song of Triumph, and I seek to keep this positive version of events
in my conversations going forward.
During my show’s run, I visited my photos and smiled and sang in the hallways, looked and spoke lovingly to the artwork, talked in words of happiness and joy,
felt good all up and down those hallways.
I took photos of my happiness and gratitude
at what had occurred and manifested visibly so quickly in my life.
I had wanted to have a show downtown (I did) in a beautiful old historical church,
with a show I had wanted to display for many years.
And no matter who tried to hate on it – some closer proximity than others –
it was beautiful and memorable.
I am reminded of the Old West idea of a gunslinger.
The guy has such a vibe that everyone tries him;
everywhere a stranger stepping up to challenge him
with “Who Do You Think You Are?” energy.
In this case, this feeling is also accompanied by
“Knock You Off Your High Horse” to put a plan into action.
My strength and superpower is that ever since I was a young girl
I have possessed a very strong natural psychic presence
and deal with “Who Do You Think You Are?” energy like the air I breathe
throughout school, travelling, and very odd spontaneous encounters with those triggered by my mere presence every day.
Connected to love and witnessed by God every day for the purity of my intentional heart,
My experiences dealing with envious evil eye ego diva drama energy
stems from constant Divine connection
to this assured inner self
who answers “Who Do You Think You Are?” with a quiet glance.
My little ‘sparkler’ awakened by my vulnerable questions
is a firecracker in my daily life,
moving out all the nonsense people
wanting and wasting her Dorothy’s valuable energy.
God bless my intuition through Spirit
and release of attempts to connect into my energy
as oftenandoftenasoftenandoften
and from WHOM as often as needed.
May every memory
entangled in emotional betrayal
be transmuted through Spirit
into forgiveness, healing, and light.
With obsidian in my pockets,
laughter in my eyes, and love in my heart,
I am dancing back into my life
whether you see me or
just hear about me from a distance.
“Just because you lost me as a friend, doesn’t mean you gained me as an enemy. I’m bigger than that, I still wanna see you eat, just not at my table.” ― Tupac
Dorothy Perry specializes in personal portraits imbued with deep feeling. Contact her here.
I am thinking of you all the time
XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOX
Love, Mom
I found this thought at the end of a letter
I wrote to my daughter years ago.
Intuition places these things in my way to contemplate,
and in this mindset, I see evidence of my behavior with my family,
with people I knew, and people I wanted to know.
My Gordian knot if some think it so, but a rich source of emotion
like the experienced Advisor in your ear in the shadows,
providing wise input as well.
Today I want to raise the counterintuitive idea
of seeing signs of your earlier self in these little ways,
to learn about yourself and your little ‘likes’
by being familiar with your internal body sensations for ‘yes’ happiness
and where you get your feelings of childlike delight
(mine is making snow angels!)
Enjoy what happens when you begin to treat yourself
as a person you care for,
find nice things for,
think with interest about,
enjoy time with,
and want to see succeed.
Dorothy Perry seeks to capture the energy of the Divine in photographing portraits and special occasion events. Contact her here.
Some people say.
“Living well is the best revenge.”
I feel that living well
is ‘mental’ before it becomes material.
Seeing vastness of abundance
(visually, spoken, or in emotional feeling)
in the early dreaming planning stages
of envisioning great feeling life
enriches the picture with the small details
that make whatever you create
just right for you.
Dorothy Perry loves being a cheerleader for intuitive awareness. Contact her for photography or intuitive readings here.
