The original is done with pencil, ink, watercolor, acrylic and egg tempera paints on acid free Somerset paper.

Back in the early eighties, while living in Vancouver, B.C.,Canada, I was involved with an Arts Co-op. Artists from all walks of life and territories had been fortuitously thrown together. Our collective of 8 artists had managed to get a source of funds to be able to create a Co-op. For the first time in my artistic career, I could create art,without having to concern myself with the daily struggles of financial survival. We had funds to sustain our individual family lives. This created an enviroment whereby the group interaction encouraged each of us to excel and grow creative exponentially.We were able to spend a great deal of time together and naturally we talked.

We would discuss and debate many topics in an effort to expand our individual knowledge base. We had lively exchanges with the subject of Pallendromes.
Kinikinik.”Kinikinik” is a word from the Anishinawbe Language that means”Something good to injest” or now commonly discribed as “herb”.Then we tried to do oxymorons. Progressive Conservative was mentioned.We all laughed at that one but one of the artists was offended.
It was shortly after that I thought up “You Are Not Alone At Being Alone” as an aside to my rambling thoughts about how we humans are in our bodies trapped seemingly by ourself in there but can never be alone what with just a thought we can be anywhere, anybody or anything.
I had a vision to create this great image using some basic designs as a starting point. I had wanted to interpret Mother Nature as a reclining female form giving birth to a river.My memories wandered to my early childhood and fondly recalled the times I had spent by the river with my grandpa Pete Kabatay. The spring fish spawn came early and we were prepared to catch as many as we could, so that we could dress and smoke the fish.Sitting on a blanket of rabbit furs, watching my uncle and grandpa fishing, I caught a glimpse of the eagle flying. The mig-ee-see ( bald headed eagle) was also fishing and flew off with a struggling golden eye fish.Up close, I saw a dragon fly skimming the surface of the water and suddenly with a slight splash, the dragon fly had a small fry fish in it’s grasp.A little while later, I looked at another dragon fly attempting to do the same thing but with a louder splash, a walleye fish swallowed it.The mist from the waterfall hung all over and I could see through the orbs of water all of this fantastic distortions of the scenes playing out.. This circle of life played out in front of me.
This piece was originally a study.I was intending to do a color version with egg tempura. Maybe someday I will.
I had also been doing fast impressionistic drawings of personalities. What I meant is that , I was doing art based on something that symbolized a particular persons identity. I had chossen to do one on the silkscreen expert of our group. His penchant for deep Christian valued sermons conflicted with the “Indian” sense that we were exploring as a group and he was out of place as the rest of us were attaining an awareness of being cultural warriors. Many a moment was spent on trying to get him to understand but his closed mindedness was very limiting. I chose to render this piece as ” The Last Supper” using his favourite theme. It essentially was a plate being thrown onto the table with peas flying off. It was simple and beautiful but rather then see the beauty , my friend chose to decline ownership and gave it back to me. Whilest admiring this art, a loud thought of inspiration came to me and I proceeded to add unto the image with the intent of this being a study for the egg tempera piece that I had envisioned.A hundred and thirty two hours later it was done.

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