THE ORIGINS SERIES | CHIANG MAI, THAILAND

In the fall of 2019, I travelled to the North of Thailand to explore its tropical landscape as well as experience a two week art residency at The Earth Hotel in my one of my favourite cities, Chiang Mai.

I wanted to set an intention for this art residency and for how I’d approach my practice.

MY AIM WAS TO CREATE ART THAT GOES EVEN DEEPER INTO MY CONNECTION WITH THE EARTH’S ELEMENTS AND ANCESTRAL REPRESENTATIONS OF THE REALMS (THE UNDERWORLD, THE EARTH, THE COSMOS).

Knowing how to describe my art and to pin exactly what inspires it gets clearer and clearer as I connect the dots. For me, one of the missing pieces in the puzzle was ‘context’. I got to connect with context when living in Crete. I have recently been so fascinated with the origin of life and where we come from - and it got me into appreciating history, which our island has so much of. Studying ancient civilisations, the art and messages they left behind, really opened a door for me and connected me to my lineage and to that of the world around me.

EVERYWHERE I GO NOW, EVEN WHEN I FIND MYSELF ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE GLOBE, I SEEK TO KNOW ABOUT THE PAST AND LIKE TO CHANNEL THESE SPIRIT ENERGIES BY BEING IN NATURE, USING NATURAL MATERIALS, UNDERSTANDING AND INTEGRATING SYMBOLS IN WHAT I CREATE. WRITING OR TALKING ABOUT THIS BRINGS SHIVERS DOWN MY SPINE. I OFTEN FEEL LIKE I AM CALLED TO GO THERE AND THAT I’M JUST A VEHICLE FOR THESE ANCIENT VOICES TO COME THROUGH, TO HAVE THIS SPECIFIC GROUNDING ENERGY RUN THROUGH MY BODY.

My time at The Earth Hotel and just generally, experiencing this environment change really allowed me to take it all in and to dive deeper into myself. Out of this practice came out hundreds of sketches, smaller paintings and then finally, larger pieces that became the center pieces of this body of work.

Inspired by ancestral stories of creation and the earth, each of these paintings was made on beautiful handmade thai paper using natural earth watercolor.