This week in the course I’m taking, we are to steal a few ideas from a favorite artist. At first I was going to steal from Leonora Carrington, but I didn’t feel that excited about it. Then for some reason out of the blue I thought of the artist Trenton Doyle Hancock. I’m mystified why he came to mind. I […]
Stealing
Inviting Horsewoman Back
I had the thought that I’ve been struggling with old archetypes because I am not putting myself in the right state before working with them. I am deliberately rendering them instead of letting them flow out. Horsewoman is a potent archtype for me. I decided to experiment with being present with her energy before painting her. I had a couple […]
Self esteem and @tiktoktraumadoc “Iffirmations”
The past few years I’ve been at the tail end of perimenopause. Hopefully will go into full menopause ANY DAY NOW PLEASE. It really is like going through puberty, so many changes, in every aspect of my life. I saw the video below on TikTok and really loved it. IFfirmations! In the Find Your Joy class I am taking, the […]
How to deeply explore your inner world
Original, fresh, new, innovative, groundbreaking. Fuck ’em. Find your myths. Find your idols, symbols, guardians, guides, angels, totems, whatever you want to call them. Call them cliches if you want. Find YOUR cliches, and love them, squeeze them and hold them tight. What reoccurs in your dreams? Moments of synchronicity? What image do find yourself spontaneously drawing, even if you […]
From spirit to paper to clay…
If you ever get tired of feeling like you have to come up with new ideas, fret no more. There are two reasons. First: reiterating symbols and themes allows you to explore and understand them more deeply, so stop trying to come up with new stuff and see what happens if you try working with the same ideas in new, […]
Who’s in charge of your art? (AKA, how to believe in yourself)
I’ve been dabbling with a blog post about the different approaches to art making. This was triggered recently by a parent who signed up to participate with her daughter in my Kids’ Art Camp. I was excited to get a parent participant, but unfortunately she didn’t realize what she was signing up for. Thinking that the class was going […]
Do you love your body?
I miss being 8 years old and how freely I danced. My mother was in graduate school, and she listened to classical music while she studied. And I would dance. And dance and dance. I loved to move. Until puberty. This is familiar story to so many women. The moment when their body became a stranger. The realization that their […]
So what exactly is Expressive Arts? And what does it have to offer you?
This is my manifesto. 1. Expressive arts is intermodal Not just multimodal. Intermodal. That means we use the different modes to see our images, thoughts and yearnings through the different lens each offers, in combination with each other. Our cells express hidden wisdom through expressive movement. Spontaneous image making is a form of active imagination – dreaming while awake. Improvised […]
Atheism, Mysticism, and Art
I call myself a reluctant atheist.
Pinned down, I do not truly believe in anything supernatural. And my shoulders sag a bit with this admission.
And yet.
My life is better, so much better when I pretend that I do believe otherwise.
Inner wisdom from collage
Sunday was grim and stormy here in the mountains. A perfect day for art making with good friends. I lead them in a collage project that helps us draw from our own intuition and inner wisdom, an approach I learned from expressive arts therapist Jane Goldberg. On the back of three pages, you write a question that you need guidance on. One […]