Gelli Print Fringed & Waxed (Encaustic)

“Walking was an essential component of our work. There was music. There were rich silences. Times of deep listening, experiential drawing and the gathering of “gorgeous nothings”…spontaneous poetry noted while wandering as well as performances of aleatory poetry created by reading together.”

Is this Heaven?  This is Australian artist India Flint talking about the first of some masterclasses she held this year in Newburgh, a village on the banks of the River Tay (Scotland). It was a site-specific four-day intensive focussing on “… the deep experience of place through immersion in this very particular tidal riparian landscape.”  She explains,

“i work

on a rural property

at the end of a dirt road

dusty in summer, muddy in the rainy season

dyeing the things that i make

with leaves that i gather from the paddocks

in a cauldron over a fire fed with twigs

small twigs burn bright.”

I’ve been exploring textile art and dyeing and blundering and stumbling around (poetically!) looking for signposts. Lo and behold I’ve ‘acquired’ by the grace of God or serendipity/synchronicity – or pure accident if you don’t adhere to the God principle – a new studio – at the end of a dirt road, dusty in summer, muddy in the rainy season – connecting me again with wild nature and re-confirming to me – via emotion – that this is where I ought to be, and to be creating.

India Flint: www.indiaflint.com

Enjoy!

Ann