This week’s Wanderlust25 lesson was taught by Shawn Petite, who I’ve followed for years. The project involved journaling, prepping the page with collage papers and ephemera that have meaning to you, and using washes of colour that relate in some way to what you wrote. The last step was a self portrait. I won’t go into all the details with it being a paid course.
We started by doing a practice colour wheel. I chose to go slightly off the primary colours, and used DWM Lemon, Lapis and Ruby, with DWM Umber and White, and Liquitex Parchment. It’s not a combination I’d tried on a colour wheel before and I like it.
People who know me well will understand why “voice” is the word I ended up with to summarise my journaling…
My initial layers, there’s journaling under the collage.My colour wheel, complete with a smear thanks to Sabrina’s paw!My completed page.
Sometimes I veer off into florals, faces, or other distractions, but my deepest artistic love is the landscape. Memories of the landscape, fragments of the landscape: colours, shapes, shadows, glimpses…
I’m interested in what makes something read as landscape. Is it the colours? Shapes? The way things are stacked up from land to sky? I’ve been exploring the idea in small 6×6 collages. As with any series, they’re getting looser and more abstract as the series progresses.
This tested my patience a bit, but it was fun too and I’m pleased with the end result. I’ve glued it into my art journal so I can fold it out and add to it if I want. The panorama shot is a bit off and wobbly because I’m not that steady but it gives you the general idea.
I’m working on Wanderlust week 4, with Kasia Avery. The project is designed to be slow, which is not how I normally work, but I’m determined to try. So far, so good … although I did have trouble with the stitching ripping the hand made paper because the gel medium on the paper wasn’t completely dry. So I used gel medium to add more paper to the back, and tried to keep going – and of course it ripped again. Did I learn to wait? Sort of 😂
The world is difficult for a lot of people. I won’t list the reasons here because of the bots, but you know what I mean (unless you live under a rock!). In my career I have a constant awareness of the ways we can contribute as librarians. Indiviually I do what I can with things like submissions when Parliament provides the opportunity. But that’s about fighting back.
I’ve been thinking about how I can lift others up, and scatter joy and light like fairy poop. The answer was pretty obvious … ART. Last night on Bluesky I listed a bunch of works with this wording “The world is a bit awful so want to spread some joy. I’m selling small artworks for $25 incl postage, NZ only. My usual artist grade mixed media supplies. Mainly pieces where I’m testing ideas, combinations. Comment sold then DM me.”
All of them are rehomed already, which is great. What’s even better though is the sheer joy in the DMs I got from people. Am I all-but giving the works away by the time I pay packing/postage etc? Yes. Does it matter? No. I create becaue it’s in me to create, and it’s good for my mental wellbeing. I’d be creating regardless, so why not share the joy and light?
Of course I’ll continue to create works to exhibit and sell on Felt. Pen Kirk & I will keep making collab works that we exhibit and sell. But this feel right at this moment in history. Sidenote – I just remembered one of my teachers accused me of “tilting at windmills”. Better that than stand by as the world burns and do nothing.
Cath Sheard Art 