Dancing with the Sun - Litha Invocation Painting

The Journey to Inspiration...

Summer Solstice has arrived. The Pendulum of the Year has swung and now the longest day is upon us. Luxuriate in the long hot Night as the Sun reaches it Zenith with confident Brilliance. Reflect the fullness of Life all around by coming together in delicious community, Dancing abundantly around bonfires, or in the luscious solitude of self care. This Solar Blessing Marks the turn into days waning again, and the sun’s sacrifice into the earth’s bounty of Grapes & Grain. Touch the Earth and feel the warmth nourishing the future. -Excerpt from THRIFTWITCH Vol 5. Illuminating Litha by Khiri Lee

These were the words I read on Summer Solstice in 2021 during the Creativity Alive Mmmwhah! to Flagstaff Celebration.

Last year I had the opportunity to experience the Summer Solstice twice in one year for the first time. The first was the one I am familiar with, the middle of June in the Northern Hemisphere. I was invited to Perform with Creativity Alive for their Summer Solstice offering on the peak of Flagstaff, in an amphitheater dancing with friends and strangers. It was a peak experience of my year! As part of the performance/ritual, I created a great golden disk for the center of the space. It became an anchor for the evening. We danced around it. We danced upon it. We sang to it. It reflected the glory of the Sun on the longest day of the year. I knew I would take the disk home and it would become a canvas for a new work of art, infused with the joy of that moment.

The Second opportunity to enjoy Litha, Summer Solstice, was in December.

I was invited to visit Brazil for a friends wedding. I was honored to be a part of such a special celebration, and my friends were the most amazing hosts, sharing all the best parts of their hometown, Niterói. This was my first time traveling below the Equator, and it was a wild miracle to travel from Colorado Winter snow to tropical Summer heat, and back again in the span of 11 days. I brought hundreds of painted paper feathers, to capture the rays of that southern light, with me. I watched the Sun dip below the horizon from the beach on my second Solstice. Once I returned home, the papers feathers were woven onto the canvas that was infused with energy of the Creativity Alive event.

I am still curious to see how this Double Sun year will affect me. As a witch the turning of the season is an important part of my grounding, and I missed Yule (winter solstice). This opportunity to soak in the zenith of the sun twice with paint and ephemera, dance and celebration inspires a flirtation with mythic reality. And then to integrate that experience through creating an art object that is both a memory of my Litha Journey as well as a reflection on the power and beauty of Solstice feels miraculous. (The final piece is at the bottom of this post.)