How do you become unstuckable as an artist? When inspiration dries up, or you’re feeling too tired or stressed to create, what do you do? That’s where a daily practice can save your day and inspire you to keep going.
Trouble in Paradise
In an Icelandic town known for its postcard beauty, trouble looms ahead. Still reeling from an avalanche nearly 18 months ago, the small town of Seydisfjördur is about to have industrial fish farms in the fjord. Locals are up in arms and the arty community is rallying.
"Have you Gaelic?"
Being gifted Gaelic titles for some of my artworks while in Scotland has given me the key to a map of landscape. My accordion fold artist book Pilgrim Stranger with its Gaelic name Coigrich Taistealach has unlocked this landscape as a place of mystery which I have entered as a pilgrim.
First Marks
You can never un-know what you know. In the midst of extraordinary beauty at my artist residency at Cove Park, I discover that just over the peninsular is the UK’s largest nuclear submarine facility. It is almost as if, in the midst of beauty, we need to scar the landscape in the most spectacularly catastrophic way. How to make art to reflect this?
Place and Story
Each place and landscape has its own story, but it is relative to who is the storyteller. Shetland for me is about knitted jumpers and the BBC series Shetland. As I walked along the streets of Lerwick, rain shimmering on wet concrete, I felt like I was a character in the this story of place and identity.
Trusting the Process
Every time I get nervous or feel under pressure to perform, I remember to let the work develop itself, to find its own story that needs to be told. This is what happened when my photograph of two chimneys became a metaphor for dispossession in a series of artworks devised at my artist residency.
Stones of Destiny
Stone Circles, houses of stone and hills of ancient rock form a narrative of time, place and human interaction with this animate landscape in the Outer Hebrides. They are the beginning of my Stone Stories project.
A Hebridean landscape
It is surprising what art you make when asked to express your emotions, starting with anger. I hadn’t realised how angry I am with a government that denies climate crisis. My art started with bushfires and floods and ended with the happiness I felt being in this Hebridean landscape.
Courageous Creating
How do you challenge ageism, live an adventurous life and inspire other women to live their dream? Creating a passion filled life is an act of courage. As an artist travel is one way to create passion and inspiration.
Building Community
Art plays a huge part in community building. In Hertford, just north of London there is an artists’ initiative called Brothership studio.The Brothership's philosophy is about 'Tribe' - artists working together, collaborating, sharing their knowledge and making art accessible and valued by the local community.
Chance and Serendipity
Art and war, chance and serendipity. Intertwining themes for me this week as I attended the Collect art fair at Somerset House in London. How do you make art when all around you is in turmoil.? What role do textiles play in helping to mend the world and disrupt the narrative?
Residencies: Part Three
The first part of any residency is always reconnaissance, getting to know the lie of the land. Much of the work is site-specific, responding to the new environment with your own ways of creating. Ideas emerge as you walk the landscape. Lots of photos, sketches and writing. As I write, I right my path and find my way forward.
Residencies: Part Two
In order to apply for an artist residency you have to be prepared to pay. The costs could include flights, residency costs and living allowances. Which is why many artists apply for grants to help offset the costs.
Residencies: Part One
How do you apply for an artist residency and how do you prepare to go to one? There are three key components in each application process that I use when writing my submissions. You need to articulate what you do, why you do it and how it fits the application criteria.
Of Stories and Travel
Take the germ of an idea that helped build a community thirty years ago and transpose it into the digital age. The Travel Art challenge has its roots in screening 16mm films in a rural library and building a socially engaged audience.
A Daily Practice Retrospective
I’ve written many blogposts about having a daily practice, for experimentation, documentation and accountability. What I now realise is that it is also an important tool for reviewing your own artistic development.
Why Exhibit (and where?)
What is the allure of exhibiting in a public space and what are the exhibiting options? There are numerous considerations when you are applying to exhibit, some involve cost, some money. Both group and solo exhibitions have their own benefits.
Good Vibrations
Einstein said “Everything is energy and that's all there is to it. Match the frequency of the reality you want and you cannot help but get that reality. It can be no other way.” I’ve noticed that when I choose to be happy, no matter what is going on in my life or the outside world, my energy lifts and I attract good things into my life.
Personal Geographies
Many of my early creative works involve maps or journeys of one kind or another. Maps and stamps took me around the world when I was a kid, it’s no wonder that I love them. This year I have returned to collaging maps for my 2022 daily artworks.
Year in Review 2021
It’s been a year where I have happily spent probably 70% of my creative time on zoom. This was the year I became courageous, started painting again, created new and surprising artworks and leaned into my role as an arts mentor.