A few years ago, I sought to bridge the gap between art and the I Ching. It was during a period when I reconnected with painting and felt a great, inexplicable, profound, and wondrous creative force emerging. In that search for meaning, for words to express "that" which was present, I began asking the I Ching for a hexagram to describe the heart of each painting. That response, that painting, and a narrative about the time I was living through gave rise to many reflections. I found that each painting "captured" a fragment of that time, a crystallization. An image that encompassed a meaning, and that meaning could be "named." In that process, which lasted for years, one hexagram in particular kept recurring and caught my attention: hexagram 22, Grace. “The sign shows a fire that bursts forth from the secret depths of the earth and, blazing upwards, illuminates and beautifies the mountain, the celestial height. Grace, the beautiful form, is necessary in every union, so that it may be ordered and amiable and not chaotic and disordered” (p. 170) The essence takes form, and that form is beautiful. Art is a journey into the depths from which emerges something immaterial, yet something we somehow need to express. Through art, we express and give life to that which eludes us: the meaning that resides within us. This journey we undertake, this descent into the inner self, brings us peace. The noise falls silent, time seems to stand still, everything is pleasant and serene. But it doesn't last long. Because upon finishing our artwork, we return to the turmoil of the world. “This sign indicates a quiet beauty: clarity within and stillness without. It is the calm of pure contemplation. And in that sense it is beautiful and withdrawn from the struggle for existence. It is the world of art. However, mere contemplation is not enough to definitively quiet the will. It will awaken again; and all that is beautiful will then have been nothing more than a fleeting moment of exaltation. Hence, this is not yet the true path to redemption (...)” (p. 171)