Quitter
Quitter by Sandra Rinck
Quitter is about quitting smoking or vaping. I did this one the morning after my decision to quit for good. The importance of it is recognizing what it does to the heart and how it is a soul sucker. To look at yourself knowing that it needs to be done is hard because for many of us, we built an entire life around it and to truly let it go brings some feelings of sadness that you have to get past.
It was made as a reminder to myself and to others that the positive things we thought it brought to us were a lie and now you have to face it. The swamp is symbolic of growth. Like the lotus that grows in poor conditions, we can also rebound and grow again. Grow into a better version of ourselves but to be reminded of what we left behind.
The cattails are symbolic of finding peace in letting go of something that is destructive. The full moon is the path in the darkness, giving meaning to the common symbolic understanding of illumination and waning. The “dolphin eye” is a symbol of intellect. That we do know quitting smoking or vaping is right and we know why.
Sometimes our hearts and minds don’t always see eye to eye but we do recognize that we are letting go of a lifelong relationship and it’s not easy.
Truly, this piece is for those of us who need to be reminded of the journey. It doesn’t matter if it’s smoking, vaping, drugs, or relationships. It hurts to say goodbye and need to be reminded of why we let go in the first place so that when desire to return creeps back in, we have something to reflect back on so we don’t go back.
The Traveler
The Traveler by Sandra Rinck
The Traveler is about Cern, a former employee of data collecting firm who accidentally stumbled into a lab while trying to sell your data back to you. Cern was accidentally taken up by a particle beam and instantly vanished, never to be seen again. Cern now lives as an observer of the multiverse.
Unbeknownst to me, CERN actually went missing back in 1943. Who really knows how long Cern has been around, or where they're actually from. All I know is, Cern gets around and we made contact on December 12, 2025.
Wolfsbane Symbolism
Wolfsbane Art Print by Sandra Rinck
Symbolism and Reflection
Monkshood, better known as Wolfsbane, is a symbol of chivalry, concealed strength, and sacrificial protection. Monkshood was historically used in assassinations, hunting (e.g., poison arrows), and ritual magic, emphasizing its symbolic ties to danger, death, and boundary-crossing. Beautiful and poisonous (due to the alkaloid aconitine) it is a plant of spiritual protection, secrecy, and shape-shifting.
Associated with Hecate and Persephone, its hooded bloom reflects the masked labor of devotion.
Used in witchcraft, warfare, and folklore to ward off danger or invoke transformation, monkshood reminds us that true power, like love, can be both protective and perilous.
About This Piece
I started this piece over a year ago as an entry into an oracle deck I was creating. I have since ditched that project, deciding to focus more on art prints where I don't have to be locked into one style. The original inspiration really just came from being in my garden. I don’t actually have this plant in my garden, but I do often imagine living in a cottage on the coast of England in solitude instead of the fiery hellscape of the Central Valley.
I redid this particular one a few times before I was satisfied with it.
Self Portrait. Chicken or Rose?
Who are you? This is the question be purposed by this surrealistic, imaginative and psychologically fascinating work by Sandra Rinck.
Self Portrait by Sandra Rinck
When I was a kid, I had a really hard time just saying my name when asked. In elementary school, they used to make all the kids stand up and say their full name and then something that they like. I used to sit in dread and watch everyone before me. I don’t know if I was really listening because I was so focused on how I would say it, “I am Sandra Rinck. I like my teddy bear.”
It was a simple task that all the other kids had no trouble with. Yet in my head it was like I didn’t want to miss my turn. How do I explain it? It was like I had to be right on cue. Don’t hesitate, just get up say your name and something you like, sit down and it will be over. I was riddled with so much anxiety. Pronouncing my name was difficult for me. It’s like saying “wreath”, I hate that word. But like that word, I would pronounce my own name “wink” but it was more like “vwhrnk”.. something like that.
After I had successfully botched my own name, I would rattle off something else. You’d think “I like Buttercup”, was an easy answer that would fulfill the assignment but no…. Instead it would be something like, “I don’t know.” Then the teacher would try to prompt me to say something else and that just made it worse. To this day, I still don’t like it when people ask about myself because I don’t know what to say.
Just like when I was a kid, people expect a simple answer, yet I never seem to look at life as if it is easy, or answers are simple. I can’t fully explain why I say what I say, why I draw what I draw and why I find it so hard to just be “normal”. On the outside I look “normal” but on the inside my brain is a never ending web of all things all the time, all at once and I have to just pick one thing.
Pick one thing, damn it!!!
I can’t! That’s the trouble with my brain.
In this piece I didn’t know what to draw so I picked a flower, a rose, because I liked a previous rose I had drawn. I thought it looked pretty so I copied it. But when I copied it, it didn’t look like a rose anymore, it looked like a chicken. I even thought to myself, “why does that look like a chicken to me?” Without any answers to that question, I just continued on thinking about chickens.
Then I sketched up this whole scene (not seen here) where there were two opposing chickens, one was a fat cat aristocrat and the other an oil field worker. One wore a top hat, the other a ball cap but clearly that is not what this is, is it?
Nope, instead I started thinking about how interesting it is that the foundation of the rose looks messy or unremarkable but with a little bit of refinement it can be so much more. Anyways, I don’t always know how I get from one point to the other, I just start thinking about things, I see things while I am going and then I attempt to draw it or paint it.
As for the octopus, I don’t know why I couldn’t get it out of my head so I put on here because clearly, the octopus just needed an outlet.
What is this piece about?
The art is about being refined, the way we see ourselves, the expectations, the things we do to be presentable. We tell ourselves that we are smarter than that and yet we still become victims to our own mentality. We are always chipping away at ourselves just to be presented and rejected. People talk about how authenticity matters yet, from my own perspective, authenticity is what gets rejected.
No one sees who you are underneath and then you have to wonder about who YOU actually are at your core. Who are you? Do you even know? Are you the blobby mess, a chicken or a rose? Are you a chicken too afraid of your own reflection? Are you happy with who you are but burdened by what others see? It doesn’t really matter how you look at it, the point is that in this world, we are always being processed and refined, and moulded into what someone else wants.
What do you want?