The Living Light of Other Worlds.
Thought Forms is a body of work made in Philadelphia by artists Dan Cole and Bixa Burgos dyed exclusively with natural materials such as flowers, roots, and tree bark. Their soak stain and sewn color field paintings celebrate the hidden color of plants and the mysteries of the natural world.
Thought forms, known by Tibetan Buddhists as tulpas, are energetic patterns that exist in nature and are formed by our thoughts. In her 1905 book Thought-Forms, Annie Besant describes forms that represent inherent qualities from the astral and mental planes. According to Besant, “The radiating vibration conveys the character of the thought, but not its subject.” Like a thought form, this body of work mirrors the vibration of otherwise fleeting moments in which humans and plants collaborate through a creative process.
Inspired by visionaries of the Color Field movement like Mark Rothko and Helen Frankenthaler, as well as contemporary colorists like Polly Apfelbaum, this work aims to immerse viewers in the emotional, contemplative realm of color.
Bixa Burgos received a B.S. in Materials Engineering from Purdue University in 2018, and an M.S in Textile Engineering from Philadelphia University in 2020. Dan Cole has an undergraduate degree in painting from Tyler school of Art and has been working as an artist and artist’s assistant since 2010.
Our Medium
Our work, influenced in part by Frankenthaler’s soak stain technique, is created by dipping folded canvases in consecutive flower dye baths, blending layers of thinned pigments to create vibrating images. The colors are derived exclusively from plants such as indigo, marigolds, madder root, goldenrod, and many, many others. The pieces strive to reflect the life energy of the dye plants harvested for this work.
How it Started
Read the blog post below to learn more about where we began, and our journey into the world of natural dyes.
Contact us at studio@thoughtforms.art