Aging is a natural process. It is also very much a women's issue. Resisting the cultural phobias about growing older begins right at home -- within our own bodies. How each of us sees our own aging process can in turn influence how the culture sees it.

Today, those of us who choose to name ourselves Crone do so to raise consciousness around issues of aging. Paradoxically, at the beginning of the 21st century, the ancient Wise Woman Crone archetype is emerging within women all over the world. We are beginning to realize that this third and crowning stage of female life (the one our culture throws away) is more authentic, creative, outrageous, powerful, funny, healing and profound than we ever imagined.

"This ongoing, artistic exploration of menopause and aging revolves around the archetype of the Crone-ancient wise woman, sorceress, and elder. Artist Helen Redman, in giving electronic form to her "Wise Woman Crone" hopes to help society reclaim the symbol, once representative of the actualized woman and the fruition of wisdom and life experience. All who linger at [www.birthingthecrone.com] enter a metaphorical terrain resonating with transformation. Here, visual and written works course with ethereal energies as age erodes the protective shell of hidden fears, revealing the honesty that comes with mortality. Through crowning and croning, we unwrap the beauty of the ever-turning wheel and all aspects of the Goddess: the comfort of birth, life, death, and rebirth. Look and be renewed." -- Wired Magazine, 1996
My website has grown like an ever turning wheel since its 1995 launch. I have tumbled along with the site from birthing to being the crone. Now it is my intent to be a cybercrone beyond my lifetime so others can find a guiding hand to creatively live the seasons of their lives. While my computer-generated life started at the birth of my crone, my art life began decades earlier. As I look back and move forward, weaving the threads of my art into a digital archive, my son Paul Barchilon and I are constructing a historical sampling of my art. Pregnancy & Children is an exploration of pregnancy and motherhood with life cycle sequences of my children and grandchildren from 1962-2009. Bodies of Work begins with The Moroccan Women, a collection bursting with color and pattern created in 1971-72, and culminates in Turtle Diaries, my most recent series, from 2008-11.

Please stay tuned, browse at your leisure and revisit for updates and historical additions.

"Redman's journey as a woman and an artist has been one of self-discovery and awareness. Her body of art is an evolutionary collection of images exploring what it is to be a woman from pregnancy and motherhood to maturity and cronehood."
~Tess Heimbach, Curator