Seasons come, seasons go…

Here in the UK it’s Autumn. I live in a country that is blessed by clear seasons although climate change seems to be slowly altering the weather patterns year on year.

Occasionally we have the odd bright day when the landscape is gloriously colourful – our deciduous trees go out in a blaze as we creep into winter but the UK isn’t known for its bright and sunny weather! Most days are misty or drizzly and getting short, it’s storm season and I know how I feel about this time of year has changed. I think it’s since stopping my day job that I see the elements more, feel the rhythm of days. The distraction of work in an office or though the world of the computer screen has gone and it’s not the first time I’ve felt unsettled in Autumn.

The best thing about seasons and weather is that nothing is permanent, and there’s nothing we can do to change it despite our best efforts going on about it all to friends! Times of pulling back and drawing in are part of the seasonal creative rhythm as much as the life-force of Spring, and so I’m trying hard to be patient and kind to myself at a time I find myself feeling somewhat ‘autumnal’. Despite preparation for winter, trees are still busy collecting back the nutrients for future, fallen seeds of potential lie in waiting – there’s still a bit of something going on.

One of the the benefits of being interested in different things is that I can switch about and choose activities that don’t require as much creative energy as others. For me, painting is hard work, I love it but it takes a lot of energy, so being able to switch to hand-stitching is one way to remain gently active. The other thing I notice is that there are parts to work that simply require some doing without too much creativity. These are processes I’ve tried and am familiar with and I can create a little more automatically. I’m trying to do a bit of this as each week passes. If a week goes by without though, that’s ok, too.

I’m slowly working on the wall figures – they are made from layers of papers on muslin and take some drying so I’m doing a couple at a time and leaving them down the warm cellar to dry before adding more paint and texture. I have a number of quite busy figures now so I’m trying to make some plainer ones so that they don’t all compete with each other. The temptation is always to add more colour and interest so I’m having to tell myself to stop regularly! The up-side is that they take less time as I’m not re-combining lots of pieces.

This one is getting some moss – I create the surface and then see what it needs as I go along. It’s very process-driven but if I don’t force things, they are better for it.

I’ve been working on different representations of moss for a while. The most time-intensive of which is bun moss. I’ve made it by stitching tightly looped embroidery threads and cutting through but it takes SO much time it’s ridiculous!

I’ve also had the privilege of talking to a friend about braille and she has leant me a machine to try. The Song of the Stone Wall (on which my piece is based) is a poem by Helen Keller who was deaf and blind and it’s such a lovely opportunity to experiment with including some of the lines of her poem in braille. I’m not very good and I’m sure there will be plenty of mistakes but I’m loving that I can at least try. I’ve yet to see if applying paint will make the bumps in the paper disappear a little. I may need to paint some paper first – it will be an experiment!

The other thing I’ve started is a set of stitch-cloths based on the elements. I’ve chosen fire to start with – it seemed apt with Autumn and bonfire night etc. The cloth will eventually become tiny pots (of course!) and it gives me something to do particularly in the dark evenings. I’ve struggled a bit finding motifs and ways to represent fire but I thought I’d just start and see what happened. Now that I’ve made a start, something is coming more easily. Often the way!

So that’s it for now… if I can carry on with these couple of things for now I will be pleased.

I have recently heard someone talk about viewing ourselves as the sky in which the weather and seasons of life and emotions happen; they come and they go. We are not the weather, we are the sky. 🙂