Almost exactly two years ago I came up with the first ideas for the body of work that became “Tales from the Moors Country.”
I was at my parents’ house over the Christmas period and everyone was out for the day. I was alone, in my pyjamas, eating chocolate for breakfast and watching Disney’s “Alice in Wonderland.”
I had been to the local craft store a couple of days earlier and had bought some supplies for a “playbox.” Coloured cellophane, glass beads, several types of diaphanous fabrics, and I suddenly had the urge to play.
That afternoon I sat with my camera and my remote control and I took picture after picture after picture. I experimented with putting all kinds of things in front of the lens. I played with my flashgun. I wrapped myself in different pieces of fabric. I started to combine different shots in Photoshop and I started to bring in outside elements and combine those too.
And, just like that, it began. Something that seemed so pointless and meaningless shifted into the germ of the seed of something bigger. And by the springtime it was a real idea, ready to be put into action.
It occurred to me that many of the important shifts have happened at this time of the year. For me, midwinter is the time when the ideas come. It’s a time when I decide to make changes, to make shifts.
Why is this?
Because, in midwinter, after the madness and commerce of Christmas is over, there is a stillness and a peace that allows the time and space for reflection. There is nothing to be done, no where to be.
I don’t know about you, but there aren’t many other times in the year when I’d be sitting on the couch eating chocolate for breakfast and watching my favourite movies. I’d feel too guilty, too lazy. I’d have to get up and go somewhere or do something.
At Christmas, just for a few days a year, we sleep more, we sing more, we laugh more. We take a walk in the snow covered woods or on the beach.
We let go.
And when you let go, when you allow yourself to play, that’s when something magical can happen.
So my Christmas wish for you this year is that you give yourself permission to be still and see what happens. This may be the only time in the entire year when (even for just a day) you don’t have someplace to be……..That’s what makes it magic.
Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas and a Joyful New Year.
