Turning Simple into Sacred

We are three days into 2022 and I find myself contemplative. Philosophising. Pondering as I am wandering, wondering as I am ruminating, musing as I meander.

When we are more connected to the world around us, the natural world around us, we can’t help but live more fulfilled lives. In my creative process I find myself  feeling into how the natural world informs the way that we live, how we communicate to the natural world, to each other, and to ourselves.

I immerse myself in my creative process while surrounded by trees and birds and butterflies and wind whispers through leaves - even in suburbia. I try to focus on this, and drown out the sounds of kids and dogs and mowers and cars, sometimes more successfully than others. Noise cancelling ear buds have been a game changer. Even better, add some birdsong from Spotify to bring nature unabashed into my ears - I recommend this Songs of Disappearance (Australian bird calls) on repeat. Even so, I long to be in quiet, secret spots, where I can feel a sense of spaciousness, where there is room for deep breaths and even deeper thoughts. Connecting to nature is connecting to my deeper self, to peace and contentment within and without - I am drawn into that wonder. I marvel at the mystery of mosses. I find wonder in wild things. I seek compassion and connection and curiosity, and thankfully, you can find these things everywhere, if you look for them. That deep dark forest is my idyll, but this little suburban block is where I am currently rooted, where I get to unfurl, and where I will flourish until wilder lands become home. The forest is in my heart, and with me every day no matter where I am.

I am working in graphite at the moment - that silver grey was always my first love. I am expressing my creativity in other ways at present, building Wander | Wonder, and the longer class that will come after it 15 Minute Enchantments, but time with pencils or paints on surface is non- negotiable. And so I have chosen a (relatively) simple medium. Here, simple does not mean easy, though. My focus is not colour now, it is value, darks and lights and mid-tones coming together to create form, manifesting depth, expressing life.

Conversations in monochrome.

I think this is becoming a series - Australian raptors in graphite. Perhaps. Or maybe there will just be this white-bellied sea eagle, and this wedge-tailed eagle, who is taking her sweet time to show herself on the paper.

New supplies alert: Faber-Castell have released these Pitt Graphite Matt pencils, and I think I may be in love. The first part of this wedge-tailed eagle was done with regular graphite, I have just now added some 14B - yes, you read that right, 14B! - and the darkness is just glorious. And not at all carbon/charcoal like, which the Staedtler Mars Black are, and which I found too distracting. Shall I let you know my full review later, when I have played with them all a bit more?

So yes, these two graphite pieces are sloooow pieces. Coming together in a leisurely manner while the bulk of my creative energy is expended elsewhere, and it kind of delights me, I have to say. This wedge-tail has been staring sternly at me for a couple of weeks now, the sea eagle for a week before that.

I still haven’t finished the lorikeets, and they are so close to done.

Soon.

Lately I am dismayed at how fast paced the world is now, how art is becoming content, often barely glanced at, barely visible in a never ending feed-scroll, a stream of beautiful, soft, harsh, bizarre, uninteresting, engaging, helpful, hopeless and more. So many feelings, thoughts, emotions - positive and less than positive. How our attention spans have been hijacked by dopamine fixes and over stimulation, and no longer allow for routine deep observation.

I have been thinking about my place in all of this, and what I want for and from this work that I do.

I want my work to encourage a slowing down, an intentional way of being, of living, to look deeply at the natural world around us, the flora and fauna that is our kin. To be mindfully conscious of the smells, the sounds, the textures of the wild parts around (and inside) us, to build a community that values the same. To value that extraordinary transformation where finding wonder and joy, compassion and curiosity, turns the simple into sacred. To be more in this space with you, where we can have quiet, meaningful conversations. 

Let’s talk a little more about this in Wander|Wonder.

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Find out more here: www.natalieeslick.com/wander-wonder