Inklings: No1
Copper Ink in Process - Made from pipes found in my dad’s shed, Pembrokeshire, west Wales.
Sent as Newsletter January 11th 2021 -Sign up at bottom of page.
Inkling:
(noun) a slight knowledge or suspicion; a hint. From the Middle English 'inkle' meaning to utter in an undertone.
Hello to you,
How are you doing?
These INKLING newsletters begin in this new year, by no grand design but perhaps a hint of possibility.
Bringing together documentation of my current Natural Ink. work with news updates, upcoming workshop information and reflections on creative practice.
A regular(ish) letter to you, following the utterings often found in undertones. Noticings from the steady arc of moon, sun and season. If I am completely honest from the get-go, they too are a space for me to let the often rabid need to make and express have some space to roam.
To order things, disorder others and communicate. It may be a frantic falling out of ALL the things at first. Making space for something is a bit like that, isn't it? Finding a rhythm and a stride through doing.
I warmly welcome you along and hope that you find something of note in these offerings.
Marks in Mapping: Black-blue ink from Mango Skins + Iron oxide. Red from Avocado skins + stones. Somerset Oak Gall brown-black. Graphite and Aquarel.
I like to think in ink.
I find out what I really feel about something on the page. It illuminates. It sates. It keeps cogs turning. You may also know now that I too need to walk.
A compulsion to put one foot in front of the other for no other reason than to move. To unclog the joints and brain matter. A few hours is a delight. Thirty minutes will do. Thankful to live on the edge of farmlands woven with pathways. Things come together when in motion. An idea solidifies. A shape forms. A letting go and shedding.
I have begun to talk to myself while walking. (If the path is free from fellow human amblers.)
Out loud and to the bare and subtle mists of red and purple bark of hedgerow bushes. Giving voice to what needs some air. Old dry narratives and new, live threads connecting. This last year I have noticed the seasonal micro shifting and its effects on my physicality and mental states more profoundly than ever. Enforced isolation. Surrendering to, if not rest, then something slower.
Noticing again and again how challenging this is to various other parts and voices that sit inside this faltering human. Ever in awe of the wider cyclic knowing of the natural world around and inside me.
There, there is no push.
Here there is visible dormancy and unseen tending in these winter days.
Great forces of frost and fog engulf and define.
Frost and Fog. December 2020. Nailsworth, Gloucestershire.
In November I set the intention to spend January off Instagram.
I enjoy using this platform a great deal to share work, be in conversation about a multitude of topics and to be inspired by other makers. I have, however, been noticing that my Instagram relationship this last year has been intense at best and all consuming at worst. In stepping back from the buzz to take a look at The Natural Ink. Project, and how I want to grow this sapling over the coming turn of the seasons, felt key.
To allow a little more space between thought and action, and temper the input and stimulation coming in from all angles.
For those of you who find social media a “take it or leave it” kind of deal, you may not think this decision to be much of anything.
The social scroll is a firm part of life.
I have noticed my need to get more and more of a dopamine hit from the small squares more and more intolerable. I know that I’m not alone there. It is the way it is designed. Built to be intoxicating. To hit with the dopamine and to keep us on it.
Coming off completely for a while has felt like the best way to get some breathing space.
To roll with the ebb and flow of one cycle of the moon, not just a few days or week. To pay attention to how this feels, especially when lockdown restrictions tighten and minimal movements and human connection become less still.
I am surprised and delighted to say that so far, so good!
The lead up to coming off felt somewhat strained with concern I was doing the wrong thing, and let’s face it, a big dollop of FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out.) The first few days I felt the impulse to check my account and noticed the “oh, I should photograph that and post about it” thoughts. However, they soon faded and I have settled into things.
Following an inner call to go a little deeper in honouring winter and all it brings. My small flat lit with candle light in the evenings, curtains drawn early.
Darkness cocooning.
Mapping Marks 2:Black-blue ink from Mango Skins + Iron oxide. Red from Avocado skins + stones. Somerset Oak Gall brown-black. Graphite and Aquarel.
I am tending to the roots.
Downloading Insight Timer and using this as a good way to meditate with others has been revolutionary! (Or rather to “beditate” to use a term a friend shared.)
I feel much less overwhelmed and have more brain space to follow inklings to make, research and write. Not profusely, I might add. This isn’t a productivity brag. But my inklings can percolate and be followed more easily without the sharp cut off of Instagram scroll time. Grateful for the financial sustenance from state and savings I have to keep afloat.
I am taking this opportunity to take a breather and not react so much as pause and respond amidst so much uncertainty.
This is a new experience for me, to step back, look and plan.
Living month to month as a freelancer and having a mind and body that can run away and sing with pain when the adrenaline kicks up, I have become used to high stress as a baseline. To living in fight, flight, freeze, fawn.
Blinkered, tight and repetitive.
A little breathing space with the basics covered, enforced home time this last year, and a ramping up of the self-care is bringing with it a wider view. A longer-term perspective. Which too feels somewhat at odds with the large question marks over our collective future.
The red-alert, is easing a little.
I cannot see with much clarity what is ahead, but somehow now that I am listening to my body more and more I notice a feeling of groundedness growing in me that I fo not have the words to describe as yet. But somehow, against all odds, something is growing.
Taking root.
It is in the reflective and more spacious days of wintering this January these reflections and realisations are gathering on the page.
Growing Lines: Oak Gall Sepia, Oak Gall Black and Avocado Pink.
So too are lines of found colour. From memories of landscapes and pathways walked. Sketches and visual notes hungry for a bigger space to roam. A roll of metre wide paper propped up in the corner is asking for some attention...
I leave it there for now and wish you well. And if wellness is a push, that you have kindness around you to help and hold.
Thank you for walking with me,
Kathryn
PS: Three good things:
Something to watch: The new Netflix musical “The Prom” is pure camp, queer joy to the MAX. If a sequin-clad tonic is your cup of tea, you're welcome!
Something to read: Bernadine Evaristo's “Girl, Woman, Other”. Unputdownable.
Something to listen to: Yesterday was the 5 year anniversary of David Bowie's death. Last night BBC 6Music and Radio4’s aired their 'Dancing Out In Space' programme. Captivating.
New Roots. Plants gathered at the beginning of Lockdown 2 and used to dye embroidery thread, pre-mordanted with oak gall solution.
Bottom (L) Dead dock seeds (M) Plus strong alkaline (sodium carbonate + homemade lye water) (R) Plus homemade iron rust water.
Top (L) Yarrow flower, stem + leaf. (M) Plus strong alkaline (sodium carbonate + homemade lye water) (R) Added homemade iron rust water.
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Arriving near Nailsworth at the end of October, I soon began the ritual of walking out from my new base to get my bearings. Greeting old plant friends in their period of retiring to the soil for winter rest. The crispy seeds of Red Dock and a little Yarrow on the cusp of returning to ground.
On reflecting upon the shifting of the season to winter nesting, I felt drawn to experiment with dyeing embroidery thread, along with making small samples of botanical ink. Something about domestic slowness in the darker months speaks busy hands sewing by lamplight.
A romantic vision on one hand. Also a strong intention to create gentler activities than screen heavy news reading and Netflix watching for the longer nights. Anxiety held in the chest and fizzing to mind has been a fixture throughout my life, and heightened this last twelve months.
Creating ways to support slowing down when not out walking the path as an act of care.
In these changing times and seasonal shifts, I wish you well.
May the path be kind to you,
Kathryn
