Between 1st - 30th November 2020, I was most fortunate to be able to attend the ADF Arts for Recovery, Resilience, Teamwork and Skills Program (ARRTS) Program 20.1.
The ADF ARRTS Program is an arts-based program to assist permanent ADF and Reservist personnel facing health and well-being challenges, or seeking to 're-set' themselves by rebuilding their confidence and resilience.
You can read more about it here: https://www.defence.gov.au/jcg/arrts/
On the third day of the ARRTS Program we undertook an “Everywhen” activity, which was a reflective exercise relating to Charles Perkins’ quote: “We know we cannot live in the past but the past lives in us”. This “Everywhen” activity linked into my intent for my art project. I wanted to create a number of artworks, using new and challenging techniques, that were both meditative and focussed on my connection with place, the landscape, the terrain, and environments where I felt most at home.
The results of this project were a tactile, handmade art book of my works in various media, some of which were created using new and exciting techniques and mediums.
I titled this book 'Macro, Micro' because as you turn the pages you alternate between macro-level landscapes that hold meaning for me personally and micro close-ups highlighting the beauty of some natural phenomena.
You can view these pages and some of the other activities we undertook (stamp making, puppet making, clay sculpture, eco dying, and linocuts) at my ARRTS webpage here:
Simultaneously, I also completed a printed art book publication titled: 'Everywhen: A Spiritual Geospatial Journey' to explain my connection with the landscape and map addiction through artworks, photographs and storytelling.
The slide gallery on my ARRTS page above is an electronic version of this publication. Or you can view it at full size here:
