The title for the upcoming exhibition ‘Rewilding’ has become a theme as well as a title. A word that encompsses the past, present and future and an idea as I’m discovering that’s ‘political!’
To me Rewilding feels challenging and inspiring.
I am exploring art still guided by my icon of the past 9 years, the dandelion clock.
I started these small paintngs on card until rediscovering some wonderful texutral elephant poo paper bought back from Zimbabwe over 25 years ago. Then the pieces started to really come alive for me, layered in texture and meaning. In connections.
A dandelion seed, vast as space, reminds that we all come out of the earth, we are not vistitors to the earth.
We are FROM the earth, not ON the earth.
We are the seed, the air, the water, the soil. We are influenced by the stars, the sun and moon. We are the cosmos made from the planet.
We too will return to the ground, to the wind, to the water.
A dead fly found in my studio unites with 25 year old elephant poo.
Seeds as wishes speak of hope, of lightness of spaciousness.
Small paintings of a small planet.
I paint and remember being five. Collecting dead insects, worms and pieces of broken Victorian pottery. I am filled with joy at the treasures in my pocket.
While we are here we live WITH the earth.
Take time to listen to her, to respect her.
Ask what we can do for her today?
Small acts, small gifts are priceless.
A dandelion seed blown into the wind with good intentions becomes nectar for a bee and a breath of hope and inspiration in your life
It’s a change of perception.
When we change the way we look at things the things we look at change. (Wayne Dyer)
We can do it! We can do it! We can change our minds.
We don’t live on the earth, like some tourist, we are part of the earth, we are the earth.
We are part of everything and everthing is part of us.
Just somehow along the way we have been convinced that we are not wildlife. That the natural world is somehow seperate to us. We have been convinced that the earth is just a commercial thing ripe for the plucking.
How much is left to pluck?
We walk around blind. Lost in our own worlds of individualism. Selfishly refusing to see because it is painful to look at the beauty of the planet, to be open. It’s easier to see the world as seperate to us.
I hear people say, ‘it doesn’t matter what I do, I am only one person.’ Or ‘I won’t be here then.’
The bee is the most important being on the planet, not you or me. Not the individual. The individual doesn’t exist. We are dependent on each other. Dependent on the bees.
It’s like we have forgotten which way is up!
These small paintings will be part of Rewilding at the Edinburgh Festival, Whitespace Gallery.
I am thinking to hang them low and provide a cushion to sit on to view them. An invitation to look at detail, to dream.
Can you still sit on the floor? On the Earth? Crosslegged like a five year old?
Small paintings as an invitation to sit in the grass like a kid and wonder at the insects and flowers that keep the world alive. To pick up a dead fly and see how utterly breathtakingly beautiful it is.
To really look is an adventure.
We don’t need to travel on planes to explore the world. It’s waiting in the garden and pushing up through a crack in the pavement waiting for us to be with it.
With much love, Kirsten
