Breaking free

Breaking free

2007

H 30cm x W 20cm
H 12" x W 8"

Oil pastel

A man in prison is sent a prayer rug by his friend. What he had wanted, of course, was a file or a crowbar or a key. But he began using the rug, doing five-times prayer before dawn, at noon, mid-afternoon, after sunset and before sleep. Bowing, sitting up, bowing again, he noticed an odd pattern in the weave of the rug, just at the quibla, the place where his head touches. He studies and meditates on that pattern, gradually discovering that it is a diagram of the lock that confines him in his cell and how it works. He's able to escape. Anything you do every day can open into the deepest spiritual place, which is freedom.