Who is she?
I want to create a blog piece for Mother’s Day without it being about actual flesh and blood mothers.
I’ve got one. A mother. I am not one. A mother.
I am, however, an Art Mother.
I create pictures.
I birth them from bits of nothing and scraps of something.
I midwife other people’s creativity.
I like that term, Art Mother. What do you think of it? Do you connect in any way?
The Sad Girl has Helpers
Sally Swain
So I go
a-scrolling through photos. What to share? What fits?
Ha! I find this paintage in its early stages.
Think About Content
Just a background.
Think about content, it says.
Well, exactly. I’m trawling through my images, wondering blog content and what feeds contentment.
Something big and bold? Something complex and many-layered?
This one speaks to me. I feel tender towards that hunched-over girl. I feel tender and motherly towards that hunched-over, slightly sad, introspective girl who is probably me at times. I am grateful she has helpers – a kind person and a wee bird angel. Aww.
The Sad Girl has Helpers
Sally Swain
This is what she evolved from.
The Blurry Sad Girl
I don’t have earlier photos of the paintage in process, but I reckon it was one of those ones that started with simply playing. Colour, swirls, purple. Torn paper. Small images and textures. See what reveals itself in the Art of Emergence.
Let us celebrate the inner mother tending to the inner child.
May we all find creative ways to nurture our vulnerable selves.
Hurrah for Art Mothers.
A Red Womby Nurture Corner
chair, flower, cushion
with love, art and soul from Sally
Art and Soul Space 
Hey Sally – “you did good!” as that expression goes. I’m not a mother now, nor will I ever be, as that ship has sailed. But you are right – we creative types nurture a thought or an idea and bring it to fruition … birthing an idea … I like it.
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Yes indeed. I feel that creative power is too easily diminished or disregarded in our corporatised culture. Maybe we’ve been taught to be scared of our own creativity. What do you think?
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dear sally, thank you for this beautiful post. I have no doubt you have birthed not only art, but many many artists through your nurturing and your nourishing. happy mothers day to you and if we have been taught to be scared of our creativity maybe its time we forget those lessons and let those new shoots and bloom make their tender way out of the dark into the light.
xxx linda
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How gorgeous! Your response and image of ‘those new shoots and bloom make their tender way out of the dark into the light’. Yes. Thank you. Poetic you.
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Art Mother is a perfect description for you. 🙂
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Why thank you, Gallivanta. You are a kind woman. Hope you’re going well.
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🙂 🙂
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I’m not a mother, however I also always thought of my art pieces as children and was happy when I did small editions, I could still keep one and let the others go to be enjoyed by new families. Now I’m happy that my art be it poetry ceramics painting drawing has a positive connection with someone and that my “children” are healing not only to me.
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Sande! How lovely to hear from you and to read your story of what I call the Creative Love Exchange. (might sound a bit mushy, this name, but I haven’t been able to think of a better one that captures the cycles of giving and receiving, nurturing and being nurtured via creativity). Wishing you well. x
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Thanks Sally and for the writing prompt; this Mother’s Day is bittersweet as it’s the 2nd anniversary of my mother’s passing.
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Sending you warm cosy wishes of soothingness.
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