Visual Journey Week 10

Patience for the Creative Process

This past year I have tried to embrace the idea of a slow, creative process. Not coming naturally, it has been a really difficult shift for me. In the past, my work has been involuntary-a reaction to trauma, erupting quickly from my body and heart. In this way it fueled my healing, much like coals under a fire. I engaged in this creative, healing fire for several years and it brought me to many different crossroads within my work and life. Looking back on it today, I realize how interconnected being creative is to my core sense of self. When all seemed lost, it was still there, grounding me.

In my efforts to slow down, I have found that having a multi-step project is very helpful. I can visual the outcome of these projects (at least in a blurry sense) while still holding space for unexpected learning and growing opportunities to happen.

So, here’s my current project: Mixed-media journals launching in my shop at some point in the (near?) future.

The thrifted and recycled fabrics that I carefully dyed and dried, are becoming something. I spent several weeks shooing the cat off of them, picking them up and staring at their vibrancy, ironing them, laying them next to each other, stacking them into piles, and then repeating this process. It sounds a bit crazy, I’ll admit, but this was part of the process. They had to live within me and now they are ready to move through me. I have had no capacity to respect this great becoming of art up until this point in my life.

Here is the beginning of something…

Much love and gratitude to each of you for reading and journeying with me. In the spirit of all beginnings and becoming, here’s a favorite quote from Richard Attenborough-

“The arts are not a luxury. They are as crucial to our well-being, to our very existence, as eating and breathing.”

XXX Char