Washing machines and Watercolour pens

Art and Soulie Spot 10
Stories from the Creative Path

Presenting the beautiful writer:

Kerry Littrich…

I vividly recall the first creative playshop Kerry attended maybe ten years ago.
I remember her uncertainty about what was on offer. Once she felt more sure that this was to be a safe space, she gave herself 700% to the process. She let her big heart shine. She willingly shared her intricately woven fictional characters, who, over time, became as real to me as any of the playshop participants. Maybe we needed extra chairs around the table for Kerry’s living breathing human creations.

Here’s her website: Imagine365

Over to Kerry for a small adventure…

The day off

I am a writer.

I mostly write fiction but I also write non-fiction articles, blog posts and run a whimsical website called imagine365. Sometimes I write copy for other people’s sites or help them create business materials. But today I’m not going to write because I worked late last night in a different job and

I’ve given myself the day off.

            So I start propped up in bed, pillows all around me and a cup of tea to hand. My miniature fox terrier, Rupert, joins me but don’t tell my husband.

dog photo

Kerry’s Rupert

I speak to my sister on the phone,

there’s no hurry.

We catch up for 45 minutes. I spend almost an hour longer in bed meditating with a second cup of tea.

            When I do get up, there’s

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a seed of a dream

Art and Soulie Spot 9 

Stories from the Creative Path

Sally McKern’s Creative Circle of Life continued…

Sally McKern art

Held
Sally McKern
© original art

Click here for the story so far (Part One).

Part Two

So now my baby girl daughter is 23 and I am 46

She is a beautiful young goddess in her own right.

Looking back on all of this now I am realising that these creative moments were crucial points in my development.

These experiences went a long way in defining who I became as an adult and who I am today.

My beautiful son is now 19 and he is also out in the world doing his own thing in the big city like his sister, hundreds of miles from my home in the country. I am not so identified now with the mother archetype, not in the same way I was when the kids were growing up. Now my holding and guiding is done from a distance and there is more letting go and observing.

Sally McKern art

Child of the Universe
Sally McKern
© original art

All these years

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Creative Circle of Life

Art and Soulie Spot 9
Stories from the Creative Path

Sally McKern art

Child of the Universe
Sally McKern
© original art

Introducing Sally McKern, a wonderful woman who isn’t convinced she is creative, but you will see otherwise. 

Sally’s mother attended my first ever creativity workshop way back in 1993, when Art and Soul was called

Art for Heart’s Sake.

Sally contacted me this year to see if she AND her mother AND her daughter could come along to a playshop.

I was touched.

To me, this is the Creative Love Exchange

in action.

It’s the Circle of Life. 

Oh My Goddess Swain book

Greena – Goddess of Recycling
Sally Swain © original art
from ‘Oh My Goddess!’
Bantam, USA, Australia
1994

Here she is….

Creativity over the Generations

Part One

Sally Swain asked me if I’d like to write something about creativity and I said yes because I love Sally, but the biggest part of me has no idea what to write because in my day-to-day life I don’t feel very creative.  

I don’t feel like I have anything to say nor even

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Ever heard of the Neurocosmos?

Art and Soulie Spot 6

Stories from the Creative Path

Musings on Creativity from the multi-faceted Becky Ridge

What follows are Words by Becky and Images by Sally:

Listening (aka GListening) Sally Swain © original art

Listening
(aka GListening)
Sally Swain © original art

Finding that space of stillness…

Imagination is cultivated in an environment of stillness and timeless rest. A settling into one’s core.

 

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At first it felt weird for me…

Art and Soulie Spot 5

stories from the creative path

Introducing…ta daaa….Val Andrews…

Val Andrews is a visual artist who writes about the creative process.

Orchid woman in green Val Andrews © original art

Orchid woman in green
Val Andrews © original art

Here is her story –

“For me, the art-making experience started in childhood, and soon became a great escape from the stress in my troubled family.

I would hide in my bedroom and draw convoluted patterns as a way of focusing on something other than what was happening in my home.

Over the years the patterns became

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The Divine Ms U

Art and Soulie Spot 4
stories from the creative path

Ulli Hansen

Ulli Hansen

Welcome to the world of the amazing technicolour Ulli Hansen,
who landed in Art and Soul at the turn of the millennium.

I called her the grooviest woman-in-her-sixties I knew.
Later, the grooviest woman-in-her-seventies.
Without

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Red Girl Paves the Way

Art and Soulie Spot #3

stories from the creative path

Friends, creators, Art and Soulies, you have Sarah Gibson’s Red Girl to thank for the existence of one-on-one Creativity Coaching sessions.

The amazing Sarah came to one of my groups back in 1998. Her partner had recently died. She kept asking if I would sit with her while she painted. I wasn’t sure. I’d been running groups for several years, but was unconfident, shaky, shy and couldn’t

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Art and Soulie Spot 2

Stories from the Creative Path

Introducing…the woman who listened to the sky…

the multi-talented…

Linda Neil

Linda Neil

The woman with roses growing out of her brain
Linda Neil original art

In her own words:

the woman who listened to the sky: living locally with love and gratitude

At the beginning of 2014, after many hectic years studying, writing, performing and travelling, changing health circumstances indicated my life needed a complete overhaul.

Without any clear idea about

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