The semi-fictional journal of Archibald Campbell, wild artist.
(online publication)

An exploration of the inner work underlying creative work.
Archibald’s dreamworld
and the journal he uses to access it.
In it, he explores what it means to live a quiet life, a creative life, immersed in the beauty and mystery of wild nature.
Meditations on nature, meditations on silence.
.

After a life of adventures and misadventures, the semi-fictional artist Archibald Campbell retreats to the woods of his youth to paint, to think and read, to write in his journal and submerge into the wilderness within and the wilderness that surrounds.

For more on Archibald’s origins and background visit here.

.
This work is an expression of gratitude for the gift of life,
for the beauty and mystery of wild nature
and for the sense of peace that can be found there.
.

Online journal
(Free — twice a month)
Members (two to four times a week)

.

Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful,
we must carry it with us or we find it not.
   - Ralph Waldo Emerson

.

Do you carry beauty around with you?

When things go wrong in my life, I turn to Emerson. He wrote about maintaining internal peace and equanimity regardless of circumstances. He wrote about natural beauty as a repository that one could retreat into, and there find one’s bearings.

.

For the world is not painted or adorned, but is from the beginning beautiful; and God has not made some beautiful things, but Beauty is the creator of the universe.
            - Ralph Waldo Emerson

.

The concept of the value of simple pleasure runs through the entire tradition of thinking about soul.
      - Thomas Moore

We walk to lakes to see our serenity reflected in them; when we are not serene, we go not to them.
      - Henry David Thoreau Thoreau, Civil Disobedience

Deep peace of the running wave to you
Deep peace of the flying wind to you
Deep peace of the blazing stars to you
Deep peace of the quiet earth to you
- William Sharp (1855-1905)

Life in the wilderness, especially when one is alone, is a continual contemplation and communion with God and Spirit regarding eternal values.  One does not have to assume any particular stance, invoke incantations, repeat over and over again words such as "Oom," chant, or sing.  To me these are merely hypnotic devices used to bring the mind into focus and into the realm of silence by those who do not have the privilege of living in situations where peace is all about them.  There is no doubt of the efficacy of such ways of preparation or they would not be followed by hundreds of thousands, but when quiet is all around, with no sounds but natural ones -- bird songs, wind, washing of waters against shores -- the stage is always set for meditation and reflection, whatever one may chose to call it.  Man may not be conscious of contemplation or seeking wisdom, for often no revelations come.  Normal and unplanned contemplation comes as softly as the falling rain or the first snows in late fall when the entire world is waiting.  While no great answers may come at these times, they do infiltrate occasionally and unobtrusively into one's consciousness, but usually there is simply a sense of peace, removal, and a happiness beyond understanding.
- Sigurd F. Olson, Reflections From The North Country 

. . .

For the website of Rod’s new studio and gallery in Hilton Head, visit here:

www.roderickmaciver.com