Folk often ask me about the differences between living in London and Seattle. Because I’m British and obsessed with the weather, my first response is usually, We’re guaranteed to have a summer in Seattle!
Do not underestimate the power of sunshine!
Having endured a multitude of wet torrential British summers—flooded tents, trudging over hills in full wet gear, being forced to visit the pencil museum or some equally bizarre local museum to get out of the rain—the fact that I can invite friends over for a garden party and be pretty confident it won’t be a wash-out is AMAZING!!
And so over the thirteen years I’ve lived in the Pacific Northwest, I’ve invented several rituals and ceremonies to celebrate Summer, and one is erecting some kind of tent structure in the garden as an outdoor studio.
This year it looks like this:
This one is pretty simple: A 10’ x 10’ pop-up tent (the kind artists use at a festival) which I’ve decorated with thrifted crochet and lace panels and cushions grabbed from our sofas and chairs.
There’s an ‘altar’ holding a tiny singing bowl and I’ll add oracle cards as I pull them from my decks and found objects from the garden—the blue jays usually bring me feathers later in the season.
I dry flowers from the garden every year to use as decorations in the colder months, so hanging from the structure are bunches of hydrangeas, yarrow, and lavender, and I’ll add more as the summer progresses. I’ve left lots of space for family and friends to sit with me and draw, write, or snooze in the afternoon sun. It’s a Garden Peace Tent: a place for communing and sharing.
The outdoor studio isn’t always this calm. In previous years it’s been a full-on working space where I’ve made art or carried out custom natural dye work, as below:
Sometimes it’s just been a simple cloth over a couple of garden chairs; a quiet place for reading and sketching.
The point is, it’s outdoors.
I hate being confined by a hard floor, four walls and a ceiling. I loathe being in a box.
When I’m outside drawing, painting, reading or writing, with the twitter of the birds as an accompaniment, I’m in my ‘happy place’. And my art is better for it. It’s freer, more expressive, more expansive, more ME.
The closest I get to a flow state is when I’m sitting on the grass with a large piece of paper in front of me and a piece of chunky charcoal in my hand; my eyes are tracing the edges of a plant and my hand reacts to the messages sent by my brain, making scratchy, loose marks on the paper. This is when I understand I’m connected to a universe that is way bigger than me. This is my spirituality.
This is when I forget everything that troubles me.
I stop thinking.
The art is effortless.
My breathing slows.
I create with ease.
I think all artists are in pursuit of ease.
Ease doesn’t mean the art is ‘easy’ or simplistic, rather it pours out of the artist with a sense of freedom and generosity—it’s unconstrained. As a chronic over-worker of my paintings (when I’m back INSIDE the studio) I recognise that one way I can bring ease into my practice is to work outside.
How do you bring ease into your practice?
Many of us have been taught we must work ‘hard’ to become better artists—take another class, read another book, do an MFA, sign up for monthly critiques or mentoring—but working hard is the antithesis of ease.
What if you let your intuition and feelings guide you towards ease in your art practice?
What if you stopped taking courses and reading ‘how-to’ books for a while, and leaned into what your creative soul is trying to teach you?
How might ‘ease’ help you make more meaningful, impactful, and authentic art?
Wishing you a Summer filled with easeful art making.
Until next time.
JC
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What lovely outdoor spaces! I'm so jealous. It's been an atrocious summer here in Wales and we have scarcely been in the garden. You are so right about the different interior in the brain that's created by the outdoors and maybe I'll get that chance later on this year. We are off to a music festival soon so even if it is the sound of rain on canvas at least it'll be a step closer to nature!
Lovely space. And yes, the western-northern US is getting its share of sun this year! Friends in Portland are ecstatic!