With an open heart and thoughtful reflection, Lori spoke confidently and optimistically about her work.  As divine timing has it, just two days earlier, Lori had completed her first painting after a one-year hiatus.  Life happens and seemingly external circumstances often paralyze one's creativity.  Having broken through her blockages, she was eager to jump back into doing shows, expanding her body of work, and telling new stories.  For her, being "in a funk" for an entire year was essential energy poured into creating the art of living--paying attention to one's own life as a necessary step to fully breathing and living as an artist. 

Describing herself as "self-taught", she remembers a childhood spent doodling and haphazardly scribbling on paper.  The scribbles became the impetus for imagining faces and figures within the random lines.  This innocent search for form within a senseless grouping of lines and empty space became Lori's parallel universe, symbolizing a much deeper search.  In a linear, regulated world, how could she gracefully bend and flow within and without the impermeable structure that crowded her Spirit? 

Expression through art, which she calls Artful Meditation, became the teacher that unbound her Spirit.  Through writing poetry and sketching self-portraits, she realized that abstract or ambiguous expression felt far more truthful than realism.   To stoically exist was so limiting.  But to feel genuine emotions was the burning fire that breathed life into merely existing.  Being in a place of artful meditation, Lori channels a powerful inner voice--one that helped birth her meandering style of painting.  While on the surface her paintings may appear obscure and haphazard, Lori revealed to me the profound clarity that is embedded into each of her paintings. 

Lori's journey to become a recognized artist began in June 2002.  While living in San Francisco, Lori heard about ArtAngels, a non-profit organization that supports emerging artists and arts organizations in the Bay Area.  She donated one of her paintings for their silent auction and was pleasantly surprised when it sold for $90.  Though, at the time, she was working at her day job as a federal civil rights investigator, this unexpected sale was a clear message that art had to be the heartbeat of her daily life. 

In 2004, she quit her job to officially start a new life of making art.  Choosing not to work conventional jobs, in retrospect, Lori smiles and admits she was "a little delusional."  It was a struggle and she soon realized that she needed to re-think her priorities.  In order to keep painting her priority, she had to sustain it with a part-time job.  With a BA in behavioral science and an MA in counseling psychology, last summer Lori landed a counseling job at Life Chiropractic College West in Hayward.  Having a part-time job that is stress-free and enjoyable has given her the time and mental freedom to paint.

I asked Lori about her artistic process--one that is surprisingly simple and methodical.   She paints on masonite boards because, as a "tactile person", she likes the feeling of masonite.  Using acrylics, she sponges on three colors to create a faux texture for the background of her paintings.  She then stares at the board and feels its ridges and valleys.  She describes this process as "massaging the image out."  Out of nowhere, an image appears--always a nude human figure, usually a woman or women.  She sketches what she sees.  Bold or mellow, earthy or bright, she paints over her sketch with the individual colors that formed the background.

Lori attempts to pull out the essence of a person through her art.  For her, art is a dance of rebellion.  Though her paintings emerge from a rhythmic flowing ritual involving music and incense, she openly shared the inherent, personal agenda hidden between the curves and lines for which her subtle style is recognized.

Attention to race and color as a political statement is one inherent aspect.  By choosing a multitude of colors in her paintings, she honors people of color.  As a person of mixed race, her mother being of Mexican descent, removing white paint from her palette is a symbolic part of her creative ritual.  She feels that art is "inundated with a white depiction of humanity" and an opportunity to remove white prevalence from the art world is important. 

Four years ago in 2003, Lori legally changed her name from Lori Conwell to Lori Pino.  Though she experiences the privilege and entitlement of being recognized as white, taking on her mother's family name strengthened and honored her Mexican ancestry.   

Even as Lori Pino, people will ask "Oh, is that your married name?"  Lori's silent response to this is that people habitually make hasty assumptions--assumptions she refers to as "learned ignorance relating to sexuality, ethnicity, and differentness."  Protest against such negligent thought has become the foundation for Lori's abstract, ambiguous nudes--curvaceous, sensuous and faceless.  Lori hopes that by painting figures with no facial expression, viewers will be forced to "feel what they see in a more innate manner."

The most unusual aspect to Lori's paintings may be rather disturbing.  It may be totally appreciated.  Or it may have no significance at all.  Lori's creative ritual includes mixing her own blood into each of her paintings.  This practice started 8 years ago, when she experimented with splattering her blood--acquired from a finger prick--into the background of a painting.  It was so symbolically gratifying that it became an essential ingredient in all her subsequent paintings.  Admitting it could be viewed as repulsive, Lori explained why it is vital to her work.

By using her own blood, her paintings become an extension of herself as well as an authentication of her work.  She explains that blood is a "potent life force, holding life and death sacred"--a beautiful element that unifies all people regardless of color, culture, or sexuality.   As a bisexual woman, Lori's images portray an open heart and mind about nudity and sexuality.  For her, blood also symbolizes the darker sides of life.  Using her blood as a medium recognizes the impassioned emotions of those who are cutters.  Her gift of blood accepts their pain and gently invites them to begin a journey to heal.  Thus, her paintings not only speak to the close-minded attitudes and beliefs about “casting out what is evil,” but also reach out with compassion to those who are living on the edge. 

We ended our interview with a tour of Lori's studio--the extra bedroom in the colorful, artful home she shares with Raimo, a composer/musician, and her partner of 9 years.  Organized and peaceful, it is a home that reflects two artists who enjoy sharing time and space together.  In her studio, her drawing table was placed beneath the two front windows where hundreds of beautiful green leaves brushed against them.  Through the side window, the summer sun blazed--blending a harmonious shadow between earth and sky. 

That evening after meeting with Lori, I unknowingly walked into a glass door.  Later, I reached into the sudsy dishwater and screamed as the tip of my little finger met the blade of a knife.  Were these two  "accidents" purely coincidental?  Or were sending me a deeper message?  Had I been guilty of taking the safe path by making hasty assumptions about life?  Had I been remiss by assuming that the door is always open, or that the water is always safe?

There's so much more than meets the eye.  Yet we slip into complacency with vision that is safe and shallow.  An invisible trickster appears, reminding us that we need to view life with not only our physical eyes, but also with our third eye--and most of all, with our heart. 

Now that my bruises and cuts have healed, my vision has cleared.  As a result, I have become more focussed on my spiritual path. 

Though I continue to be mesmerized by Lori's remarkable story, it is only now, as I write, that I am finally able to comprehend fully the incredible love that motivates this Oakland artist to share her paintings. 

Like the three windows in Lori's studio, there is a beautiful wholeness of light between opposites.  And so much more than meets the eyes--if we have the courage to look.