I’m quite partial to a foldout page. An add on. There’s a sense of mystery, secrecy and magic from a foldout or two!
art
One Tired Goddess
This past week has been way too busy for my liking. But it was to my liking in a way as I found it stimulating and so much food for thought.
What I need now is rest though in order to process it all and at some point it did get to stimulation overload.
My creative pot over flows and I need to channel this into something. Something I produce in order to process this last week somehow. as well as how it sits with my overall practice and how I show up in the world.
Showing up at the page each day has helped; mining my thoughts and feeling and reactions onto these pages has been a support.
I just need some more space and rest now to integrate it all. Yes that’s what I’m seeking integration.
And again this is where my visual journal steps up/ in/ through me to support this journey of becoming.
A Hot (PINK) Mess
To you it might look a mess.
To you it might look like someone’s puked on the page.
To you it might feel out of whack.
To you it might make no sense.
To me it feels like progress.
Eyes Wide Open
Sometimes I use my journal space for a rant. For a deep and meaning conversation with myself. It’s the space I can go to and be totally me and know I won’t be judged.
My visual journaling space is a time and place I can come to make sense of things that are bothering me. Which have me thinking and sometimes hurting. But it means getting it out on the page, gets it out of circulating around my body, mind and soul and pulling me down and holding me back.
Within these pages which are a mix of paints and images and words, I make sense of the world on my own terms. There might be other people’s voices that invade this space, but for the majority of time my voice reigns supreme. There is no where else in this world where my voice holds such sway as it does within this visual journal practice.
I get to try out different voices, registers, ideas and know it’s safe to show up here in all my fucked up glory.
This has been so appreciated and welcomed in these last few weeks when I’ve been stepping out more into the physical world as well as into new, expansive virtual adventures.
Knowing that I can come home to the page, after each encounter, good and bad, gives me permission and confidence to show up out there more and more as my whole self.
Improvisations
I forgot to add some paint to the page. Things got busy, I didn’t get to return to the page until the next day. Flicking through this altered book , I find I have no pages covered with paint. What to do?
I improvise. I still want to feed my soul with colour, this bright and breezy morning, so I cover a few pages with coloured papers and sticky notes. I cover the text of the original book and there you have it a blank canvas ready for images and texts and stickers and washi tape.
Whatever it takes to get out what’s inside myself onto the page daily, I will do.
Quotes are useful too
Sometimes I can’t find the words. Sometimes a smear of paint might be enough or an image to spark the imagination or to stand in for that void.
Other times a good quote is enough.
“Don’t let what they want eclipse what you need. They are very dreamy. But they’re not the sun. You are. You are the sun.” Christina Yang
Quality reminders through tough times, quotes can be just that.
Black on White/ White on Black
This page says it all.
roots, culture, identity virtual art exhibition, 2022
It gives me great pleasure to share a virtual exhibition which I’m part of.
Running from May until August 2022, you have the opportunity to visit a virtual exhibition to coincide with the TUC Black Workers’ Conference, 2022.
Marking the 10th anniversary of the beginning of this exhibition which came out from one of the recommendations of the TUC Stephen Lawrence Task Group, the exhibition aims to provide an opportunity for Black, Asian and ethnic artists with a focus on young people, who are marginalised and face discrimination in the arts and culture sector, to showcase their work.
For years, I’m been meaning to submit my work for consideration, however due to other commitments, or not even having the finances in order to ship/ take my artwork down to Marble Hall of TUC Headquarters, London, I’ve never completed the application process.
However, with the pandemic offering a different way of working and exhibiting artwork, this year, due to an extended deadline, I was able to find the time and space to submit something.
The theme for this year’s exhibition is Collective Action for Race Equality. The
inspiration for the theme comes from the horrific impacts of racism we face today globally
from climate injustice to the disproportionate impact of contracting and dying from
coronavirus.
I submitted photography that I felt reflected my connection with nature as well as the work I carry out with Earth Sea Love; to offer opportunity for developing a deeper connection with nature for People of the Global Majority (PGM). I took Community/ Collective Healing as my focus and hope my images offer moments of tranquility and healing, grace and hope.
Talking to myself
I come to the page bubbling with excitement. For what, I do not know.
I feel a change in my energy. It might be the light coming through my window. It might be the prospect of the day ahead. Or if might simply be the fact that I’m turning up for me daily when I come to the page and braindump, dream and talk to self.
Living Wild Studios 