This is a live document that will change over the course of the unit and all edits will be left visible.
What is the focus of my practice?
During the course Unit 1.1 I explored the theme of HOME and I navigated my way through various physical and metaphorical perceptions of the word. After reading through my assessment feedback as well as taking time to think through my own experience throughout the unit I concluded that I had to refine my focus. I felt that it was too wide and lacked the authenticity I needed in order to feel passionate about the practical work.
However this was not the only motivation for my change in focus. During the break between the units, I thought I would enjoy the much needed rest but instead I went through a period of deep agitated anxiety that I just couldn’t shake. I have experienced this before, and therefore felt disappointed in myself for not taking better care of myself mentally and physically over the last couple of months while managing a lot of responsibility. My inner home, the only permanent habitat that I have had become inhospitable and the most terrifying place to dwell and there was no way of escaping it, no shortcuts to take. This was a journey with a slower pace, one that heals with time and rest and silence. This befriending of my ‘uninvited guest’, is something I would like to explore as I find it to be one of the most bizarrely interesting and a the same time most terrifying experiences in my entire life. The worst of all to me, was the knowledge that other people was suffering the same. Most probably in secret and alone. There is much more to say about this experience but in short, this was part of my motivation for deciding to focus on the most valuable of homes of all and the most intricate of creations in the natural world – my inner home, my soul.
‘The body as a home‘ (the inner landscape) was explored as part of my research in Unit 1.1. I felt a strong pull to this theme as I looked at my previous portrait and figurative work. Often this permanent inner home becomes an inhospitable place and in the busyness of life and all it’s noises in the form of technology, news, social media, information overload etc. The condition of our ‘inner landscape’ is vital and it affects our decision making and experience of life in general. Why is it that our mental health can suffer under these circumstances and what can we do to restore the balance?
The Industrial revolution was the start of disconnecting with nature and as urban settlement structures caused a disconnection between families and communities (disconnection with other people as people moved to cities and split up with extended family members). This was in strong contrast to our indigenous predecessors who lived close to the land and in large communities and their survival depended on their connection to it. We have lost this connection during the industrial revolution. Many of us without realising exactly how this is affecting us. The digital revolution, also known as the third revolution, began in the latter half of the 20th century. It is becoming more evident that this interconnection with nature and other humans being are deteriorating even more and it is having an increasingly negative effect on the mental health of many. Statistics show that there is an alarming rise in mental health issues. In his book, IntraConnected, Daniel Siegel says: “How to regain our sense of wholeness, how to live with a more integrated identity and a broader belonging than that of the contemporary disconnected sense of solo self. How to reclaim our IntraConnected place in the world. Our sense of self can become IntraConnected, linked within a fabric of life.”
Due to a strong empathy and interest in psychology has always been part of my life and I have done a few courses in counseling skills. Besides this I have experienced personal struggles with anxiety which has added to my passion for Mental Health in general. Art therapy combined with Mindfulness is another field of interest that marries my love for art and psychology.
The decision to focus on the body as a home (the inner landscape) means that I will be looking at the invisible but very real and powerful realm of the soul. This in itself is still a very wide theme seeing that the soul has so many complex aspects. I touched on Identity and belonging in my contextual study in Unit 1.1 and therefore I wanted to narrow my focus around Identity, mental resilience, process, play, silence, balance, stability. Specifically the effect that a reconnection with nature has on these aspects.
I am interested in the relationship between the visible and the invisible and our interconnectedness with nature and others. The embodied self. I am interested in the creative power of thought and the subconscious mind. And so I decided to use the process, uncertainty and long recovery process of my anxiety to inspire a new direction in my art which I believe will also speak to others. Art as a therapeutic process will take emphasis over product and perfection. Mindful art practice forms the main focus of my art and I would therefore like to ‘expose’ the making process and at the same time create environments of eccentric juxtapositions that illuminate the vulnerability and impermanence of thought, emotion and the importance of focusing on and reconnecting with nature and other human beings.
My research-based art practice looks at the Inner Landscape which is our permanent and most important dwelling place and its relationship with the Outer Landscape. Drawing from the fields of Eco-psychology, Neuroscience, Eco Art Therapy, MBSR (Mindfulness), Sensory Processing (Occupational Therapy) and Ecology, my work seeks to understand how our modern age, over the past +-300 years, have affected the awareness of our interconnection with nature and other humans, and how this has subsequent affected on our mental-, spiritual- and physical health. With a strong focus on process over product, the work is open to how it can be experienced by an audience on various sensory levels and encourages a mindful approach. My practice has developed a dual focus, relating to Care, that advocates for social change in the following areas: to reduce the ongoing stigma of all mental health issues, and to create awareness about our human-nature interconnection, with a special interest in human-soil relations. My practice seeks to question whether a renewed awareness of this interconnection in the midst of a rapidly changing-, digitised- and fast paced world, can impact our Cultural Worldview and not only increase the chances of saving our living planet but also caring for our selves.
The natural world is my personal gateway to access a place of mental stillness. It is when I immerse myself in nature by slow running, that I gain clarity of thought and access my inner landscape. Nature and creating with natural materials make me feel grounded and brings a sense of belonging and safety. I learn from its slower rhythms and find it easier to connect to a spiritual source and to peace.
This brings me to another important aspect of my practice: soil. Clay soil forms the basis for all the mediums that I work with. The immersive experience of processing and working with clay as a pigment and as a sculptural medium, brings with it therapeutic benefits and beautiful metaphors for the subconscious mind. Through my research and my art-practice, I have also come to respect and value soil as a finite and non-renewable resource that serve us in many life-sustaining ways.
“Increasingly since the first agricultural revolution, the predominant drive underlying human-soil relations has been to pace their fertility with demands for food production and other needs, such as fibre and construction grounds. But at the turn of the twenty-first century, Earth soils regained consideration in public perception and culture due to global antiecological disturbances. Soils are now up on the list of environmental matters calling for care” (Puig,2017).
Puig, de la Bellacasa, María. Matters of Care : Speculative Ethics in More Than Human Worlds, University of Minnesota Press, 2017. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/ucreative-ebooks/detail.action?docID=4745533
For the answers to these questions, I will explore various ways to visually communicate this complex and abstract theme.
What are the creative risks in my practice (beside my regular practice)?
- By challenging my self to make art where the PROCESS is the focus as oppose to the product – blind contour and non dominant hand drawings and more similar challenges.
- Experiment with some more intuitive drawing and drawing from imagination in order to cure perfectionism and access the subconscious mind.
- Working outdoors in nature. Nature becomes my studio and hopefully make drawings that show more immediacy.
- Working 3 dimensionally with clay and paper mache. Using nature and wildlife as symbolic metaphors for the soul.
- Compositing and composing in photoshop using photographs taken in the natural landscape and in the studio.
What are the social, political, ecological (or other) concerns in my practice?
I believe my practice will be concerned with the human psyche and mental health and wellbeing in general (Psychological and Philosophical concern). This will make a strong case for the role that nature plays in mental health and visa versa (Ecological concern). A lot of artist and activists are focused on how we should care for the environment but often drive that concern through fear (fear about global warming and the end of the natural world as we know it). Although I don’t disagree, I would like to place more emphasis on how good nature is to US and how it serves us and that we are one with nature. Now more than ever is the time to tap into the resources it can offer as many suffer under the weight of the overstimulating digital world that is capable of creating the perfect mental health storm for some if not most of us at some point in our lives. In turn, we will naturally take better care of the environment as our relationship is restored.
Books I am currently reading:
Beauty, John O’Donohue
The self delusion, Tom Oliver
The well gardened mind, Sue Stuart-Smith
Motherhood, Lisa Marchiano
Finding the mother tree, Suzanne Simard
You and me, Susan Greenfield
Eco-art Therapy, Amanda Alders Pike
The hidden life of trees, Peter Wohlleben
The art therapy sourcebook, Cathy A Malchiodi
Latest books:
Matters of Care, Maria Puig de la Bellacasa
IntraConnected, Daniel J. Siegel MD (Interconnection with nature and other humans)
Nature in Mind, Roger Duncan (Interconnection with nature)
Switching Codes, Thomas Bartscherer & Roderick Coover
What Painting Is: About Oil Painting, James Elkins
Kruidtjie Roer my, Antoinette Pienaar
Where might my research go next?
I am busy reading ‘The well gardened mind’ by Sue Stuart-Smith which is feeding into my current work. In the near future, I would like to read ‘The hidden lives of trees’ by Peter Wohlleben and ‘Finding the mother tree’ by Suzanne Simard. I am also busy reading ‘The self delusion’ by Tom Oliver with explains the science behind how we are interconnected to each other and to nature. I the future I would like to research more into the field of Eco Art Therapy which seems to be a relatively new area within the field of art therapy. A book called Eco-Art Therapy in practice by Amanda Alders Pike is also on my reading list. Perhaps I will be able to bring this knowledge into a teaching setting in the future.
Besides the future reading and teaching dreams, I hope that my practice will grow in terms of the three dimensional work I will be experimenting with in this Unit. I feel that it has the power to compliment and strengthen the 2 dimensional work.
I would like to use the experiments and research of this MA and perhaps incorporate it into a workshop where people can experientially be involved in similar work, add to it and take it into their own practices or communities. I think this can also be an economical and effective way of: (a) Adding to the facilitation of adolescents groups who participate in ‘rights of passage’ type events. I believe this is important as it is this age group that we need to influence in order for them to take forward a Culture Worldview that authentically care about our planet. (B) Helping people in less privileged areas (especially in South Africa) who are perhaps suffering from mental illness and don’t have access to a professional health care. (C) Even assisting the elderly to manage mild and even severe mental illnesses or Dementia-related challenges.
I have recently thought about the idea of getting my work in book-form. Whether that be a wordless book – featuring my process (drawn of photographed) or even a wordless picture-book that can be read by young and old. This could serve to inspire, introduce self-care methods that can be worked into one’s lifestyle for greater mental-, spiritual- and physical health as well as to help with activism for a changed Cultural Worldview.