Write a Blog and Residency Cancelled…
WRITE A BLOG ONCE A MONTH KAREN-
Those were my words and I was determined that no matter what I would do my best to make this happen. Then COVID struck and kind of took the wind out of my sails... As I considered what if anything I had done or could share I realized I had a lot to share. I wondered if this story could be inspiring for my readers... well I will find out:)
It started on a stormy but really sunny winters morning… A steaming cup of strong coffee in one hand and my iPad resting on my lap and then a PING! notification arrived - You’ve got mail!
Okay... now comes the part that was one of many cancellations and missed opportunities from covid - the first and it sucked… “your residency has been cancelled.”
A little bit of history here: Every spring for the last few years myself and artist friends have escaped to the Toronto Island at the Gibraltar Point Artscape - for a full week long artist residency. This week is all about creating art, talking art, walking art-(beautiful walks along Lake Ontario). We fill the days with art, we share our creativity at the days end in one of our studios. We all have our own studio and they are large light filled studios! We are so lucky to have a variety of artists in this group, artists that work with felt/silk fibre, embroidery art, mosaic glass art, photographic art and abstract art painters.
My coffee grew cold and I thought -Cancelled- ugh - my beginner Covid ignorance started talking - maybe next month? No not happening... What to do?
Our group commiserated over email and then DING!!! A great idea! It had to come about I mean we are artists after all:) Why not treat the week as if we were there? Put aside everything else and create like we were on the Island. At the end of the week we would meet on Zoom and share what we all created during the week of our “home residency”. We all dedicated ourselves to creating as if we were on the Island that week - spouses had to fend for themselves, chores were set aside except for food and essentials and boy did we go for it!
On Zoom we shared our work, shared our processes of making our art, shared our fears, hopes and realities of art at that time, no shows, no galleries were open due to covid and we asked questions of each other about this epidemic but most importantly, we were there for each other. This was too good to stop now. We decided to continue every two weeks and we all decided to do a piece of art inspired by a prompt from 1 of us. We had two weeks to make a piece of art to the first prompt.
We met every two weeks on ZOOM - it was a lifeline for me during the start of covid and still is to this day of covid confinement and confusion.
It is also good for you to know that these artists are really talented, original, amazing artists. I feel privileged to be a part of this group. We have grown in ways that never would have been possible without the prompts and discussions over all these past months and sharing of the “how and why” of making our art as well as who we are and we went straight to the “heart of the matter”. Uncomfortable at times? You bet, but as the weeks went on it became easier to share real feelings, thoughts and stories that arose from these amazing prompts. It was an incredibly gratifying experience for me personally and creatively.
The art that came out of these prompts was mind blowing for all of us, our processes were changed we changed a little or a lot or some of us even threw caution to the wind on certain pieces. We made new art. We developed our own way for the new creative processes coming about from the prompts and processes of the others, we began to share the frustrations, the fears, the joys, the raw emotions that came up from the prompts-diverse, challenging and personal.
We became a team, “a dream team” called by our Kathryn B.
7 artists- 7 prompts - 49 pieces of incredible art each with their own story to tell. I am thrilled to say that we are still collaborating and now it is once a month but, we still check in every 2 weeks to have an artsy, Covidy chat.
Other things are slowly creeping in, thank goodness, as it signifies that one day soon we will go back to seeing each other on the Island and here in Ottawa for coffee, art shows, Gallery visits and until then...we create -it is what we do.
Recently, we all agreed to share our art and we have a website: Https://7workscollective.weebly.com Have a look and please let me know your questions, your thoughts on this blog and if you have a question for one of the other artists feel free to add it here and I will ask them to answer for you.
Take care, keep safe and until next time keep on creating!
Karen xo