Tender
2023
Mixed Media Collage, Paper, Watercolor, Acrylic, Spray-paint, Mica, Faux Pearls, India Ink, and Graphite
60 x 48 in

Welcome to the Studio with Komikka!

As February unfolds—a month often wrapped in the language of love and connection—I find myself contemplating not just relationships with others, but with life itself. What does it mean to surrender, not out of defeat, but through ecstasy? To be tender, not because it’s safe, but because it’s the bravest thing we can offer.

I wrote in my journal not long ago “in the darkness watering as things unfold.” next to notes the explained my use of black and the all-consuming darkness/ space surrounding my figures even in moments of intimacy or tenderness. “But the darkness pulls in everything: shapes and fires, animals, and myself, how easily it gathers them.” from Book of Symbols by Taschen. Often I associate it with the beginning, the end, or a pause. For a lack of a better word Allowance. I would like to think this speaks of surrender as a spiritual tool, not one of passivity but of profound engagement with life’s highest energies. When paired with the wisdom of Tantric practices, surrender becomes more than just letting go—it becomes an invitation to experience the present moment with full-bodied awareness. In Tantric energy, ecstasy isn’t confined to physical sexual experiences; it is the pulse of life itself when we stop resisting, when we open fully to sensation, to emotion, to being.

Drawing, painting, collaging certain engagements had me questioning. Friendships and the roles I play, My own evolution, Vibrations, Love, The essence of a thing, The essence of a realm, Fountains, Bodies of water, Initiations, and Transformations, I got to a place of realization, that revealed a root I had thought I had weeded out. The illusion of deserving.

This year, my art has followed this path—becoming what some might call vulgar, but what I see as honest and exposed. Each stroke, each form, emerges from a place of surrender, where vulnerability and desire coexist without shame. Inspired by the delicate boldness of shunga and the raw intimacy in Hokusai’s Ehon Tsui no Hinagata, my art seeks to dissolve the boundaries between transcendence, honesty, and being. It is not about provocation but about presence—the willingness to be seen in our most raw, unfiltered states.

Deserving still had permission to creep and integrate quietly into my world and therefore my art because I discovered in my curiosities, I assumed all things I did in vulnerability should be awed at and be whispered about in reverence, because I had somehow conquered something, loved something, revealed what I thought I couldn't, or accomplished something that took a massive amount of effort. My ecstasy, I felt deserved to take center stage and not only that but be praised.

A weed I thought I had weeded out had shown up attached to love

“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”
-Anaïs Nin

My experience of ecstasy began to fluctuate, and I couldn’t understand why. I felt that I understood how to obtain a state of mind, but I couldn’t sustain it. What happens when the present moment feels too intense, too overwhelming to hold? We often think of ecstasy as something external—something to chase, to achieve, to control. But true ecstasy arises when we surrender to what is, even when it shakes us, pulses through us, leaving us breathless.

In some ways I desired the feeling of letting go of assumptions, responsibilities, labels, ideas, things that conformed, and chained. But something I couldn't let go of was reciprocity, because I felt like I deserved it. And it's something that is understandably looked for, loved, and admired. The capacity to do it as well as receive it. It is associated as a sign of health and safety. As I deepened my questioning, I understood that this was something I also had to give up for initiation to maintain a vibration or to be a vibration, because it was still based in linear duality, the of it wanting at least.

There is a kind of rapture in simply allowing. In the letting go of control, in the softening of resistance, our bodies and spirits can begin to move with life’s natural rhythm. All-consuming rapture is in the room with us; don’t deny it simply because it looks like concession. To not want reciprocity looked like sickness, or craziness, or lack of self-worth. But in my wanting I was not allowing the art of surprise. Similar to Bob Ross’s happy accidents, I caught myself wrapped up in a should, based on past experience or an idea of wellness versus a revealing. Not allowing darkness to reveal her secrets but trying to force my way through based on past experiences with darkness. Surrender may cause us to tremble, breath to quicken, eyes to soften, skin to glisten. And in the aftermath—seen, nurtured, vulnerable, yet wholly satisfied—we find ourselves not diminished, but expanded. Whole.

And in this to maintain, I couldn't expect what I felt or gave to be received, liked, allowed, the same, or reciprocated. But I could allow what comes up to come up and be loved, tended to, and accepted for whatever it may be.

“Vulnerability is not winning or losing; it’s having the courage to show up and be seen when we have no control over the outcome.”
-Brené Brown

Tenderness as Strength

Tenderness isn’t weakness. It’s a radical act of courage to meet life’s intensity not with armor, but with an open heart. It’s the decision to remain soft even when life feels hard, to lean into love even when fear whispers that it’s safer to withdraw.

This mirrors the evolution I’ve seen in my own creative process. Where once I sought to perfect, to control the outcome of each piece, I now let the process guide me. I surrender to the flow, allowing my art to emerge from the space between tension and release. The result is work that feels alive—raw, intimate, and unapologetically exposed. Once again a mirror to my own reality

Living in the Downpour

Reflecting on last year’s experiences, I realize now they were never barriers but thresholds. Life wasn’t punishing me with pauses; it was preparing me for deeper connection. I was being asked to slow down, to feel more, to be more.

Spirit whispered: “Don’t tell me what you want. I already know. I’m already giving it to you. It’s not about pushing or chasing. It’s about standing in the downpour of blessings, letting them wash over us, even when they don’t arrive in the form we expected.”

The Invitation

As we move deeper into this year, I invite you to join me in exploring surrender—not as giving up, but as opening up. Whether it’s through art, love, or simply the way we meet each moment, let’s allow ourselves to feel everything. To shake, to pulse, to soften. To glow in the aftermath, vulnerable yet whole.

Let ecstasy be our teacher. Let tenderness be our guide. And let us be seen—not just in our polished moments, but in our raw, exposed truth. Because that, I believe, is the art of being. And that is what keeps me inspired.

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- Komikka Patton