21st Annual Smithsonian Magazine Photo Contest Artistic
Freshly Squeezed Orange Zenetic Puzzle

'Orange Zenetic Puzzle.' (Zen meditational garden + kinetic = moving med. mind garden). most puzzles are static, inert, dead, slapped-together cardboard images that mean, well, whatever. These puzzles are alive as they reflect the inner moving 'you.' Like 'Pencil Set # 2,' one moves the pieces about according to one's feelings, moods, etc. no correct image, just amalgamations of how you feel at the moment. The Zenetic puzzles derived from Zen gardens are stark. However, unlike the Zen “static” gardens one might walk around to get a different perspective and so be 'illumed,' in these puzze'z, micro meets/reps bountiful macro, the “puzz garden” is in a constant state of living, intuitive fluency. The marvel of the “puzzle of no puzzle”—a “puzz-puzz” without frame/reference, they are usually worked out on a lazy Susan to turn them about offering different angles of approach (and w/chopsticks). much more can be said... YOU ARE THE PUZZLE, NOT A MASS PRODUCED PICT OF GWASHINGTON. GOT PUZZ? the more complex the mind, the more complex the play or the simpler the play. Masters in many fields acknowledge that “The height of complexity runs into simplicity,” so says Sifu Bruce Lee. So these pleasurable entanglements, “toys” like a kid set of blocks, are to be enjoyed. They evoke the imagination, moods, ideas and so forth, the colors delighting the eyes and the woodiness giving a tactile workout as well. However sparse, the Zenboards and their pieces are made to move about as one’s contemplations and moods shift about, from fun to deep and broody things. They are solely a reflective mirror of the player’s mind and soul at the time of “playing meditation,” continually in flux, advancing and receding, expanding and contracting and so on. Tuition is the backbone of all art, from great theatrical performances to Indiana 500 racing. The intuitional flow state of doing is what makes these puzzles “work,” so they are a definite departure from the classical notion of a “put it together” assembly store bought puzzle as there are no directions or limitations, except that which the player makes up on his or her own in light of their feelings and moods. Thus, Zenetic puzzles can be fluent or choppy, languid or pressed, depending on one’s mind-frame.

Photo Detail
Date Taken: 10.2023
Date Uploaded: 10.2023
Photo Location: morrill, Nebraska, United States of America
Camera: CAMERA
Copyright: © douglas laurent