Belonging Beyond Borders

April 2024

Hi friends, sorry for the long silence ! Lots of new ideas brewing... retreats here in Spain.. a podcast... two new Blurb books and more.

“Belonging Beyond Borders” – new drawings, pints and Cyanotype images featured in Café Berlin 61, Órgiva, Andalucía, Spain from March - August 20234.

My latest exhibition, “Belonging Beyond Borders,” explores the complex theme of finding a sense of belonging in a new land.

The exhibition features original drawings, large scale prints of the drawings, Cyanotype prints, and collaged prints that delve into the struggles of uprooted people, including refugees, asylum seekers and adoptees, and pose poignant questions about leaving the past behind.

My art is inspired by own almost 50 year search for myJewish / Lithuanian / Russian ancestry. 

 

In this latest work I'm examining what gets left behind during the transit and assimilation process, and what makes the feeling of being at home possible.  I'm drawing on inspiration from the ancient cultures, faiths and beliefs of the Netherlands, Ireland and Russian Lithuania, lands of my birth-parents’ ancestors.

During the last twelve months my focus has been on the theme of children affected by war, and the resulting trauma experienced particularly by all involved in The Middle East and Ukraine.

All proceeds of the sales of my art go directly to aid projects in Gaza. 

It's official ! Build Creative Confidence. A holiday course in Spain.

 

    It's official !  

Here's the link to my course at the beautiful Cortijo Romero Center in Andalucia Spain - 

            February 25th to March  4th 2023.

                                               'Build Creative Confidence ' 

With the guidance of the marketing manager, we've changed the wording of the Creativity week  I shared with you recently, to fit  more with their  guidelines.

It will be a fun and fascinating week because with all the gifts you will bring with you...co creation always happens, and we learn lots from each other as a group. There will be a max of 10 people I believe

I'm not going to be telling you what to do! I'm planning to open many doors for you by sharing forty years of experimenting, and keeping a drawing dairy for much of that time.

https://www.cortijo-romero.co.uk/choose-your-course/courses/?type=&id=2734&name=Building+Creative+Confidence

A Course at Cortijo Romero. February 2023.

Hi friends, apologies for many months of silence !! Lots been going on. I've missed y'all.

After a fabulous month at Fundación Valparaiso artists residency in September, I  came home to discover I'd been given the chance to teach a weeks course on Creativity at Cortijo Romero here in Spain. 

It's been a secret dream for years. The place is absolutely unique. Many lives have been changed by taking a worksop here.  In 1996, my life was one of those. 

So here's my blurb. What do you think ?

Any feedback very welcome.

Celebrating Creativity - Alone and Together.

Explore Investigate and develop new ways of expressing yourself post Lockdown.

A discovery week exploring the fascinating world of creative tools to find your favourites then take home a strategy to make creativity a part of your daily life. 

For busy people, procrastinators, for people who love to learn new skills and use new materials, and for those who've lost their spark.

An opportunity to re connect with, befriend and co create with your inner artist, your inner photographer, your inner singer songwriter, musician, dancer, crafter, clown or any other creative part of yourself taking a siesta, or silenced or damaged by Covid.

 Leave feeling seen and heard in a new way.

In the studio and in nature we'll experiment with Suminagashi (Japanese paper marbling), alcohol inks on acetate ( for making original cards), printmaking with clay impregnated with natural found objects - bark leaves stones etc.

We'll make large and small brushes with sticks twigs and fibers to make exciting abstract marks and we'll use some spray paint on paper.

Using phone cameras we'll discover and record  close up details in the beautiful Cortijo Romero gardens. These images will then inspire many art experiments.  Looking in new ways always brings discovery. 

For those who wish, we can experiment making simple reels and slide shows with music using your phone pics.

Music poetry and storytelling will add rich colour to the week.

The  retreat is planned to inspire your creative imagination by trying new combinations of materials to discover the new creative you.

There will be an introduction (a demo) to engraving on stone and drawing on wood.

 

No previous experience with art or photography is needed for this creative adventure/retreat.

Suitable for anybody wanting to unleash their creativity and find new ways to re connect with themselves and communicate lightheartedly with others.  

Images speak louder than words.

"You can't use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.”  Maya Angelou.

New retreat starting Easter 2022

Drawing in Wisdom. 

Walking new paths in the land of the Spanish mystics. 

A Good Grief Retreat with artist and writer Meg Robinson

 

An unforgettable week with notebooks or sketchbooks and cameras in beautiful rural Andalucía. Gentle or moderate walks – you choose. Silence. Laughter. Pool. Surrounded by nature. Guided by Meg Robinson and the poetry of Rilke, Kabir, Kahlil Gibran, Mary Oliver, John O’Donohue, David Whyte and 2 Spanish mystics. We'll explore and nourish new ideas for a future you never imagined possible.

Delicious locally grown organic food. Pool. Stargazing. Charming simple country accommodation. Reconnecting inner and outer worlds. One to one retreats. Partners welcome to share the beautiful environment and walk, or chill. 5 full days, two days travel.

Good Grief retreats are for men and women ready and willing to move forward towards a new life after bereavement.

 

Bereavement includes divorce/separation, miscarriage, abortion, loss of job, loss of country, loss of faith. Loss of joy, loss of direction or motivation.

  

Loss of the life we knew before Covid.

 

Is this really for me?

Photographers - phone cameras are perfectly adequate. Note- makers and journalers whether occasional or compulsive, yes. Poetry lovers, definitely yes. Wisdom searchers, yes.  Walkers from amblers to explorers all genuinely welcome. 

We have professional mountain guides for super active partners of participants, and an exceptional masseurs for everybody! We also offer an exceptional healing experience with a local much loved young Spanish shaman.

We're based in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains.

Does this resonate?

If you are willing to explore new parts of yourself, experience an awesome dawn and dusk walk with camera, be silent sometimes, soak in wisdom poems as a new kind of inner GPS, and much more, this holiday retreat is a way of  creating a renewed sense of life purpose by resetting the inner compass.

Meg Robinson has been offering Good Grief Retreats since 2003. She has a lifetime's commitment to helping others help themselves become more of their full potential through creativity, walking, and playful inner exploring.

There will be an online Zoom preliminary weekend course as a taster.

Much more info to follow. 

 

New drawings in Lockdown.

'Our sorrows and wounds are healed only when we touch them with compassion.'

Jack Kornfield—

My thoughts have not been on Covid 19 today, but in Nova Scotia.

The  dark drawing above I made after hearing the news of the mass killings in Nova Scotia.
Today I felt compelled to change it. We cannot allow fear to thrive.

Images speak louder than words.

Coronavirus. Handwashing. Creativity.

Goodbye February. Hello March 2020. 

Hand washing month, and Lent.

 Two years ago, at a residential workshop, I saw how fast a virus can travel. In 12 hours more than three quarters of the group were writhing in the loo. 

Had we all known this was coming, certainly hand washing would have been imperative.  I was one of the few who didn't get it. My room mate did. 

I'm washing my hands very frequently these days. Are you ?

Drawing before  first visit to Lithuania in July 2018.

Creativity. What's going on in the studio?  Not very much, yet.

I'm in limbo. In that 'liminal  stage' once again. That means being ' in between ' what has been created in January and February ( in my head heart and studio), and what's about to come next.

Drawings have been on pause these past two months.  Just one arrived.

I'm trusting the 6th sense more and more.  

Appreciating everything more and more.

Art play with an 8 year old Siberian girl in Lithuania 2018.

Dream ask believe receive. I do. I am.

Latvia.
An artists residency (I hope) in August 2020, in a town called Aizpute.
This is where many of my Jewish ancestors lived, I think in the 1800's.
Another DNA test is in the post.
Hoping, longing to find actual names of Latvian ancestors.

To say I am extremely excited about this project is an understatement.

Buzzing with excitement as I search for flights.

I would love to be life drawing every Wednesday, as I did for months in 2017.

My inner compass is definitely pointing towards the Baltic again.

It's that inner knowing I can't argue with.  Gotta go.

Digital drawing based on an acrylic sketch, 2018.

There's so much exciting stuff to share with you. So many inspiring stories to tell.  But, I know you live busy lives.  So my intention is to keep all my posts short now, and to encourage your creativity as much with the images as with words.

How about we all wash our hand 20 times a day and apply Deepak Chopra's sensible  advice on keeping clear of the virus? Then we can allow new ideas to flood our hearts and minds. New creative ideas which connect us to our highest  potential. Creativity and fear do not gel. We all owe it to ourselves  to be the best we can be, whatever creative path we follow. We are living in challenging times.

So,  I'm offering new retreats.

Do you want to meet your most creative self this summer?  Tame your inner critic? Reset your inner compass.  Rest and recharge  in awesome nature close to mountains, a river, the sea.   Transform your procrastination into a flow of creativity. Explore your shamanic self, deepen your spiritual connection... eat organic food, start and end each day with sacred music?

If the answer is yes, come and have a life changing week in Spain with me, my creative artist healer friends, Nature, silence and sunshine.

'Every great change is preceded by chaos.  The unknown is the only place where there is creativity.'

Deepak Chopra.

Untangle your creativity ?

More Retreat info on www.megrobinsonart.com

Art Adventures - a new way to Retreat.

After 12 years running creative retreats at healingartjourneys.com, then a sabbatical pause, the new  retreats have arrived as naturally as spring following winter.

The Retreats will now be Art Adventures for groups of  up to 4.

3 Retreats will be for solo adventurers.

Why the change?

An Art Adventure Retreat is a sure way to break down limiting ideas and transform old patterns to find exciting new ways to develop your creative potential.

The object of a retreat is usually to take time out to re-connect with our non busy self.  To get clarity about what matters most to us. To allow ourselves space and time to play with life changing ideas .

A guided Art Adventure Retreat offers a wake up, shake up call to start being creative in a brand new way.

Are you sick of being stuck in a rut? Tired of making the same kind of art, bored taking the same kind of photos, disheartened  by writing in the same 'style.'

During an Art Adventure Retreat you will discover new creative skills, experience a new sense of self, and have fun in the process!.

'What you risk reveals what you value.'

Jeanette Winterson.

What actually happens at an Art Adventure Retreat ?

Art Adventures Retreats in Andalucia Spain include guidance, encouragement, exploring nature, creating ceremony, resourcing ancient wisdom, video making, paper arts, walking, picnics, swimming in a salt water pool, star gazing, visiting a high mountain village market, storytelling, sacred and folk music, wonderful organic food, and much more.
  

You will be waking up your 6^th sense. 

Stepping closer to that person you’d love to be. Crossing thresholds. 

Deepening your spiritual connection.

Learning to trust your intuitive voice. Having fun. Sleeping well.  Possibly finding new tribe members.

Stay in a beautiful wooden yurt  or a charming casita ( cottage) in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains near Granada .

Adventures Retreats are led by Meg Robinson, artist writer explorer stage 4 cancer thriver.

  

Meg has a team of highly skilled professional helpers who will be involved in some of the retreats - musicians - storytellers - masseurs- chefs. 

Art Adventure Retreats 2020 in April May June September October November. 

Dates and prices on request.

Group  Retreats - max 4 people.

1. Art Adventure Retreat for stuck in the mud painters, 
tired of their genre photographers, and writers yearning for new inspiration.

Surprise and delight yourself by doing everything familiar differently.
Rediscover the joy and awe of seeing.

  2. A more studio based adventure exploring fun art techniques using acrylics,                      encaustic, gelatin based printmaking, drawing with found objects, playing           with alcohol  inks and much more.  

All levels welcome.

    3. Appreciating Spain's Golden Age: an Interfaith Retreat including making simple sacred art, Sephardic and Sufi music , story telling, a celebration of interfaith .
 Learning from each other’s beliefs traditions and customs.  For anybody loving the metaphysical.  A real, delightful spiritual recharge. 

Individual Retreats.

1.Unblocking what's keeping you small, allowing ideas for a fulfilling creative life to manifest.  Delicious organic food.  Befriend your most creative self and tame your inner critic thought art play, music and time in nature.

Not mainstream art therapy, but highly therapeutic

2.Outdoor art. Healing an old wound through art in nature, ceremony, creating simple riverside installations, tree drawing, picnics, music, storytelling. 
An individual ‘Shamanic’ retreat. No previous art experience required.

3. Creating Art as a Spiritual Practice, a path of devotion. 

                       Email Meg for more details at megrobinson@yahoo.com 

More info on the retreats page of www.megrobinsonart.com