While we can’t travel during social lockdown, we can armchair travel. Use this time to document your experiences during the pandemic, however gruelling it is. For it will never come again, just like I will never travel in a horse and cart again. Join me while we Armchair Travel to transform our experiences and travel into art.
Read MoreCreativity
Aboriginal hand marks on a cave wall
Creating Through Crisis
When we are advised to keep our distance, we need to know that human touch is possible, even if only virtually. Create though this crisis. Make a handprint to proclaim: I am here. Take a photograph of it to send to your family and friends. This is how you can connect with them, to show you care and are thinking of them. High 5 with a handprint.
Read MoreA failed collage - but when I turned it sideways it didn’t seem too bad - it’s still not my best but I keep turning up and trying to do my best even when I might fail.
What If (I fail)?
International Women’s Day is a good day to reflect on fear, both as an artist and a woman. What if I fail is such an overriding fear it infiltrates all spheres of life. How do we address this, what do we do to care for ourselves and others?
Read MoreCreate Your Future
In the 1980’s there was a global alternative living movement. We believed we could create so we started with whatever materials were to hand. Leaps of faith are bold. They move us forward into creating our dream life. As Goethe says boldness has genius, power and magic in it.
Read MoreSeen in a French patisserie in Carlton, Melbourne
Crazy, weird creative
I am preparing my Dare to Create course, gathering inspiration, hunting and gathering from life experience as ideas turn into actions. Being creative is a little like being a weird little beast. You are inspired by seemingly random things which later turn into works of art. Its about follow small intuitive steps steps and trusting the creative process.
Read MoreMy portable art studio ready for travel
Portable Art Studio
Some people say you need a lot of space to create in. That’s great if you have that. I have a lovely studio bench at home, but what I love the best is my portable studio. It’s my constant travel companion.
Read MoreA younger version of me with Wurundjeri elder, Auntie Joy Murphy Wandin in Healesville. Newspaper clipping from p8. The Mansfield Courier Wednesday June 30, 1999.
Small gestures of hope
This Australia Day I reflect on how art and artists can change people’s thinking. That small ideas, small gestures of hope contribute to the greater collective consciousness. Like The Vigil, which as artistic director of the Sydney Festival, Wesley Enoch says is an event “to reflect on the state of our nation in a way that’s not divisive or argumentative.”
Read MoreIt's my (not just) resolution
I’ve never really had new year’s resolutions. However this year I am making an effort to eliminate the word ‘just’ from my sentences. This one little word ‘just’ is yelling at me! Stop using me, it says. Don’t be afraid to be bold. Stand in your power.
Read MoreChildren in Venilale, Timor Leste
It's about changing the world
I believe that all change starts with one person. When we become happier within ourselves, more creative, more grateful for our lives, we are able to share this joy and happiness with others. So the ripples spread and we might touch one person, in turn they touch another and so change spreads, one person at a time.
Read MoreBackstage opening night of my play If There Be Dragons with Alex (still in makeup)
Imagination, the Language of the Soul
How do you turn your dreams into reality? Imagination! When you imagine something and then action it, you manifest your dreams. Imagination is the language of the soul, according to Albert Einstein. When I come up with crazy wild ideas, it’s usually because I have read some story in a book which has fired up my imagination. Like my play If There Be Dragons from 1998.
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