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Morpho-TheButterfly.net
Artist Profile
Morpho-TheButterfly
Contextual Notes "Room to Breathe" is the approved introductory interview developed for the artist, Morpho-TheButterfly, for the Substack series "Tell Me About Home." Habib is an Artist-Architect exploring a thesis about the affect our physical surroundings have on our identity development, especially during childhood. Click on the link to read Habib's article about this artist's formative years as the child of a pioneering conservationist in modern architecture and an extraordinary and eclectic fiber artist. They called their solar home 'Windywood.' It sounds like a fantasy realm, but it's a real place. The house has been respectfully transformed under new ownership, so only the inner child's memory of the original design serves to relate how the architect's intentional blueprint. He designed the house to guide his children with principles of social equality that fostered creative engagement. And the memory of that space persists to inform readers of the way the honest artistic practices and a passion for self expression nourished and sheltered the unique and sensitive soul that is now emerging as Morpho-TheButterfly.
In Memoria: The Conscious Designers of My Identity My father designed mirrored rooms for his two children, perfectly equal in architectural layout, like a straight-edged Rorschach. The rooms were polygons with some right angles, but not square. The second story design was purposefully drafted so the architect's children would have exactly the same amount of space for inhabiting, working and playing. Each child had a small room and our bedroom doors opened into 'the playroom' which included a built in bench below a ladder to the loft area. Each child also had their own loft, which eventually became known as the 'hide-out' area. My brother would drag a guitar up the ladder to his hide-out. I used to sketch and write in mine. It was a fun place for camping out on special occasions; sometimes we engaged in aggressive negotiations, and sometimes we wrote our names on the pine railings. Beneath the hide-outs, we each had built-in yellow formica desks. The floors were wall-to-wall carpeting. Rust orange in the playroom and hallways and Kelly green in the bedrooms. Perhaps these choices are out of fashion now, but they were actually quite vogue in the seventies when the house was built. I believe it is the fact that I was nurtured within such an extraordinarily conscientious spacial design that I have been able to develop a evolutionary philosophy hinging on the importance of human artistry in our lives. My father created a fun house space for social engagement, but he was a busy man and at work most of the time. It was my mother who activated the space for us. She is the one who followed through with arranging play dates with friends that were- for me-- actually just that: dates for making plays. My brother's friends gathered in the living room around his drum set. For my group, Mom supplied the costumes and the time and let us explore our wildest dreams. I have a powerful memory of running into her weaving studio with my friends laughing and running beside me, all of us shouting "the show is ready! The show is ready!" Mom would smile and immediately put down whatever she was working on and come observe our outrageous antics. She always laughed in the right moments and provided thunderous applause. Among my mother's wisdoms are some treasures that I seek to polish with my own artistic interpretations. Mom maintained a 'rainy day closet,' which was really just the linen closet, but she would stash random gifts in there as a form of emotional insurance for whenever that sad-- or rainy-- day might arrive. And when the storms threatened to scare her children, she would gather us by the windows to the west in the playroom and announce that it was time for a 'Thunderstorm Party,' which involved the presentation of a bowl of candy to sweeten what was scary. I lost my mother this spring. She died on the Friday before Mothers' Day. This parting was three hours, four days, one month and thirty years after my brother died of a blood illness that spared him the experience of dying by asphyxiation due to ALS. I was thirty minutes too late to say farewell. My mother's grief at the loss of her first born and only son was unendurable. I like to think that I was able to provide some joy, but there is no real cure for the parent that buries their child. My mother's story is one of significant pain, both emotional and physical. She lost her own mother the year she was married, on her birthday. Her grief was something I always felt, and I felt a strong responsibility to live up to my namesake, even though I never had the chance to meet my maternal grandmother. After my brother died, she perhaps tried to metabolize the grief by continuing to create artifacts for the people she loved so dearly. A talented fiber artist, she spun wooly fibers into yarns and knitted and wove her threads into garments and other useful items. She always had a project going and took the time to teach others from her vast wealth of knowledge about the handwork she had mastered. My mother always encouraged me to develop my artistic senses. She gave names to things and practices that I now recognize as important guidelines. She knew me better than I thought she did. When illness came for me and interrupted my teaching career, I was foundering and searching for a way to move forward. I began exploring modern music-making tools with real interest. I had shared some songs with her, hoping for her approval. By this time, her chronic illness and intense pain were so debilitating all she was able to do was smile. That was enough for me. Both of my parents have encouraged me to create something of myself. This is the impetus behind Blue Butterfly Studio, llc. In our family, we look for literary connections and attribute different values to numbers than just monetary. When my mother was too ill to join my father on outings, he would send her pictures from the trail and tap in BBS, which stood for Be Back Soon. I have decided to borrow that as my business moniker because it also works with the identity I have formed around a character I'm inviting people to see as Morpho. My urge to create art is fueled by the powerful love of human artistry my parents have instilled in me. I seek to make art that inspires others to activate their own sense of industry in the development of intellectual properties, the stuff of imagination and fantasy intent on making the world a more safe and encouraging place. I do this in memory of my mother's loving guidance. I do this to entertain my father in his remaining days. I apply my inheritance of generous loving attitude to the works I develop with an eye towards making blueprints for peace as an act of courageous kindness.
Song Notes The name of the song is "Montgomery's Psychedelic Butterfly" and it is the artist's first work using Digital Audio Warehouse tools for musical creations. This song is making a musical allusion to the song "Butterfly" by guitarist Wes Montgomery. The best way to experience the song is to listen to Montgomery's version first. In all artistic disciplines, it is a common practice for aspiring creators to study the work of prior masters. This is not theft, but gift. The song is not for sale. It is an act of love. When I met Habib through her invitational Substack prompt tell me about home, I felt as though someone was finally asking me to share something I've been longing to tell for decades. Our connection over the development of her article turned into a profoundly therapeutic discussion that led me through some intense reflection. I struggled to share my true name with her, wanting to hide out in the gray area of an alias behind a silent mask of feigned artistry instead of revealing my truer self to a stranger. But I'm not that tech savvy and my computer screen shared my name in our first video call as if to say: no more games; no more hiding, tell her who you are. But as we prepared to have her actually write the interview about what I wanted to tell her about my childhood home, I still felt conflicted about how she should introduce me in the publicly accessible article. For a while I needed to process some childhood pain associated with my nickname -- the one my mother always wanted to call me-- because I had been so injured by a bully at age five that my identity suffered a significant wound. She observed me working through that like a therapist, patiently waiting for me to get brave enough to figure out how I could say who I feel I actually am. After several months, I was able to make inner peace with old pain and told her to just go ahead and use my given name. The story of the nickname deserves its own chapter. I intend to spell it out soon. Habib was ready to print her article and offered me the opportunity to collaborate with the video-graphic portraiture she makes to accompany each interview for her project's interviews. Instantly, I knew the music needed to be the song I'd created inspired by Montgomery's "Butterfly." In the first days after my mother's death, I returned home from work and felt the need to sit outside to rest and process. My grief was mounting and I had nothing I needed to do to distract me from it. Not long after I settled, a butterfly landed on my knee. It looked a bit ragged. The wings seemed torn and I wondered if it had been injured as it sat there gently closing and opening its wings. It felt very much as though the butterfly was providing me with something healing as I sat observing its calming motions, seemingly inviting my breathing to come into synchronicity with its simple action. My cat entered the scene and the butterfly took off. The cat made an effort to swat it, but the butterfly escaped, untouched. After the cat walked away in search of something else to hunt, the butterfly returned. I was so struck by its attention to me that this time I carefully picked up my phone to film an experience that felt utterly magical and unreal. The butterfly stayed with me, walking from my knee to my foot, and I filmed its beautiful loving attention for fifteen minutes. When it arrived at my bare foot, I sensed a tickling sensation and realized its proboscis was tapping me repeatedly. At this point I began to weep silently, trying so hard not to move. I suddenly felt with every sense: the butterfly was kissing me. It appeared to cheer me and provide hope despite my loss. When the butterfly flew away, I searched the internet for some additional information, typing in the descriptor: butterfly with ragged wings, which revealed a specific type of butterfly, naturally designed to look like leaf litter as it's main fare is wood sap. It's called a Mourning Cloak butterfly and it's cultural symbolism offers witnesses hope after loss. People can think whatever they want about this encounter, but I feel certain that my mother's spirit attended my needs in her typical loving manner that day. She messaged me through the creature that has been a symbolic driving force for the changes I have been trying to manifest for years in an effort to overcome personal self-doubt and crippling fear. When I met Habib in person in early June, I was able to share the video clip of the Mourning Cloak with her. The way she used this digital imagery to offer my soul 'room to breathe' was real therapy for my grief and I don't wonder about the power of art to cure us of our pain anymore. Art is absolutely the greatest resource we have to overcome our fears and agonies in the parallel journeys we all share. Artist's Statement I believe that all are working through personalized apprenticeship programs designed by some powerful force that beckons us to grow and bloom like flowers that will seed again and continue the production of fruitful lives. While we exist on Earth, we must strive to cultivate our own voices and arrive at an understanding of what message we seek to communicate to the world during our period of active intentional agency. The song I chose to use as my artistic theme is a tribute to Wes Montgomery because his melody helped heal the identity struggling to emerge as a mature and competent voice. I am dedicated to making exhibitions of a love of honest agency while activating a new industry for supporting the production of human artifacts. This collaborative art project, Room to Breathe, (Habib's visual digital artistry plus my digitally orchestrated music) is the product that has initiated my company's development. The Blue Butterfly Studio, LLC is a virtual space for cultivating artists' intellectual properties by encouraging the creative human agency of inspired individuals. Habib's videography provides my soul with a feeling of pure joy. With this collaboration, this company is emerging as a business for supporting creators in their efforts to make something out of their imagination and determination. We recognize art is a curative for the soul. Though we may walk singly along the shared journey, though we may struggle with efforts to live authentically, though we may oftentimes fail to act in alignment with our soul's most true and real purpose, we are definitely here to act as courageous stewards of the Earth, working from a place of Love. Let it be so.
Artist's Statement I believe that all are working through personalized apprenticeship programs designed by some powerful force that beckons us to grow and bloom like flowers that will seed again and continue the production of fruitful lives. While we exist on Earth, we must strive to cultivate our own voices and arrive at an understanding of what message we seek to communicate to the world during our period of active intentional agency. The song I chose to use as my artistic theme is a tribute to Wes Montgomery because his melody helped heal the identity struggling to emerge as a mature and competent voice. I am dedicated to making exhibitions of a love of honest agency while activating a new industry for supporting the production of human artifacts. This collaborative art project, Room to Breathe, (Habib's visual digital artistry plus my digitally orchestrated music) is the product that has initiated my company's development. The Blue Butterfly Studio, LLC is a virtual space for cultivating artists' intellectual properties by encouraging the creative human agency of inspired individuals. Habib's videography provides my soul with a feeling of pure joy. With this collaboration, this company is emerging as a business for supporting creators in their efforts to make something out of their imagination and determination. We recognize art is a curative for the soul. Though we may walk singly along the shared journey, though we may struggle with efforts to live authentically, though we may oftentimes fail to act in alignment with our soul's most true and real purpose, we are definitely here to act as courageous stewards of the Earth, working from a place of Love. Let it be so.
Company Disclaimer: No artificially generative tool is used to produce our company's human artifacts. We are a Human Agency for Honest Artifacts (HAHA) because we believe that intentional artistic intelligence (iai) is far superior to any program, or system, claiming to be the originating source of Universal knowledge.
Montgomery's Psychedelic Butterfly
The butterfly's wings
dry while it swings
preparing for take off
with the lightest of springs.
The butterfly's eyes
delight & surprise
ready to make off
with shuttered replies
Get up
Stand clear
Leap off
no fear
Its time
at last
Arrive
Be here
~