All you have to do...is listen

I am dancing a jig here (uh, my Irish slang...) as I finished my 2nd painting for the week. Both of these paintings are to be sold as either silent or live auction items for the ACS Bras for the Cause Events this weekend and another fundraisor for the James Albert Foundation which is helping to build schools in Belize.
The painting here started as a watercolor on museum mounted Gessoboard. I stained the sides of this board (to enhance the appearance and preserve the wood), then taped this off to protect the sides. I then did a loose, watercolor painting of an Asian elephant and an imaginary landscape. I had a poem that kept haunting me as I painted this elephant, so decided to write this in the quiet area to the R of the elephant. I then took some Walnut Ink and a calligraphy brush and quickly outlined the elephant to make it 'pop' just a bit. After the painting dried I sprayed the surface with an archival matte spray to help preserve the watercolor on this slick surface. I then went in with encaustic medium and brushed around certain parts of the painting, giving this a dream-like texture and appearance. The last thing was to collage a bit of calligraphy on this baby. The golden, calligraphic symbol stands for 'to listen'. The photos here are deceiving in that the gold pigment I used in the writing does not photograph well. The poem on this painting is from a favorite movie of mine, August Rush:

Listen. Can you hear it? The music! I can hear it everywhere. In the wind... in the air... in the light. It's all around us. All you have to do is open yourself up. All you have to do... is listen.