Category Archives: Watercolour works, 2013

To have an Outlet and make the most of its benefits.

     We all have an activity or pass time that allows our mind to rest, to day dream and to exist in a sanctuary of peaceful reflection.

  Which is so unique to everyone…… where some use film or a novel to escape, others who run or use the intensity in lifting weights, some find utter grounding in a bush walk or a few hours in the ocean, even if a wave is not caught and while others use creative outlets: sculpture and pottery, drawing, painting, cooking or gardening .

  This interests me terribly, I have lately appreciated the channel used by certain people close to me. I watch my partner water the garden, in such peace and return from a dive for fish, with a similar peace of mind that is reached after a session of meditation. Where my Pop uses his hands in the shed woodturning or fixing something and as Grandma and I discussed, he does not like to be interrupted, as though it’s an act of zen to him.

  I have recently realised that the act of watercolour painting is my space of quiet. One that involves my utter patience, as I have recently been working small scale ( which is MINIATURE for my big hands), each application in a certain area needs to be left to dry before adding another and the applications are done with small brushes, which for me means forms are carried out slowly.This has been the best move for me, linking so deliberately and undelibertely with the meaning behind the images.

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Forms that communicate on the necessity of mindfulness; a focus on the present for recognising the parallels of human nature and mother nature; with its similar traits of vulnerability, decay, resiliance.

These notions of mindfulness, are looking at the enhancing the present, which in turn is reinforced in the gratitude and awareness of a nature based presence. And hopes to encourage the viewer/audience to retreat to these places of calm as rejuvenation and in order

to really ‘see’ life.

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I hope you will think about your spiritual place and I invite you to share what it gives you.

Cinnamon Girl x

Watercolour, pencil, ink, beetroot juice.

I have been enjoying working with natural pigments recently, like beetroot juice (another plus with growing your own.
You get an engagement of primitive quality, when working from nature. Also excited by painting with tree sap, I would like to give myself a task of finding more natural sources to create with.
The Indigenous Cultures of Australia and the World had the right approach, I would like to be inspired by such connecting//respectful practice.

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With my recent discovery of the concept Wabi- Sabi. A way of seeing and being in the world. A term that is understood differently from the aesthetic angle of: finding beauty and grace in the rustic and unassuming, to the simplicity and stripping away of excess in daily life. Just the awareness of such a perspective has inspired me as a human to absorb the beauty in the ordinary or aged. Also not unlike the country of origin of the notion- Japan; slow down and in doing so, experience a peaceful process and greater awareness.

Little things.

As an artist, I discovered my work breathes with natural parallels to Wabi-Sabi’s ideas of quietude, an appreciation of imperfection and simple acceptance of the world as is.
This was a connection, which genuinely brought be comfort.
I like to bring light to such a connected perspective,in the hope that
maybe you might get more joy out of the everyday objects or quiet moments.

If you would like to read more on this topic….’Wabi-Sabi for artists,Designers, Poets and Philosophers’ By Leonard Koren.

Cinnamon girl x