Verneda Lights

World Invisible: Angels on Assignment

18″ x 24″ Charcoal, pen & ink, and acrylic and oil paints on paper.

This work on paper depicts the world as it really is: surrounded by an atmosphere thick with the presence of angelic beings with differing ranks and functions. The view point is from above the clouds, looking down to the Earth below. The angels depicted are from Heaven (dark angels are depicted in a different painting).

Because angels exist in another dimension, they are presented as being transparent, and through their faces, wings, ornate gowns and caps, we see the more familiar geography of land, (both green and dry), and water. The angels are busy, moving back and forth, taking care of their human charges, us.

We really are immersed in supernatural activity, but the rush and press of our daily lives and ambitions move our powers of observation onto a plane where more subtle presences are invisible. What I have painted is the world seen differently, but it is also a world that is very real. (Yes, I have seen it.)

~ Verneda Lights

Verneda Lights is a Gullah-born historian, physician, poet, science writer, and visual artist who has created many Afro-surreal and Afro-futuristic works. She draws upon the visual consciousness of the African diaspora, and uses the collective wisdom of healers and griots to interpret the multiple permutations of myth/ dreams/ realities across the space-time continuum. As the author of Dog Moon (poetry), Verneda is an early pioneer of rap music, performing with her band under the name Rikki Lights. Her visual art spans the spectrum of traditional (works on canvas and paper) to digital, and her work has been selected permanent display by the Boston Cyberarts Festival, Field of Vision New York City, The Sketchbook Project, and the Genovese Design Studio. Her digital painting, “View Thru the Eyes of a Ship” was published in the first installment of About Place Journal’s “The Future Imagined Differently.” As CEO of the multimedia design and business consultancy, E-graphX Omnimedia, Verneda currently hails from Port Royal, South Carolina, the heart of Gullah country.