Or did I?

 

The first time I held a paintbrush—fifteen years after I had left school—I was at a staff development workshop. We were asked to paint what brings us joy. While others painted their families, pets, or sunsets, I filled my page with vibrant swatches of colour arranged into loose, organic forms.

 

The facilitator was struck by the difference—awed, even—by what she called the freedom in my work.

 

For me, it was not a conscious choice to be different. I just could not  see how something as vast as joy—or sorrow, or spiritual longing—could be contained within a literal shape. These experiences resist simple outlines. They are too vast, too mysterious, too deeply woven into the soul. Abstract art became the only language wide enough to hold them. Abstract art gave me a way to express that inner richness.

 

When I decided to take up painting more seriously, abstraction was not a choice I made with my head.  It came naturally and instinctively, like breathing. Figurative work never called to me. I was not interested in likeness, I was interested in essence.

 

It helped that I am playful by nature. It also helped that because I had spent years exploring my inner world through self-awareness practices, listening inwardly came easily. I have always loved ideas, connections, and the unseen threads that run beneath the surface of things. Abstract art gave them form—form that did not restrict, but revealed.

 

So maybe I did not choose abstract art.

Maybe it is where I have always been – at home.

In abstraction, I was not trying to become someone.

I was just being me.

 

What creative acts bring you back to yourself?

 

 

Featured image: Breakthrough II, mixed media on wood, 20 x 20 cm, available