When I travel, I gather. I gather inspiration, thoughts, stories, rocks, postcards, photos, memories, mementos, and the random. I travel with a notebook and an assortment of pens and colouring pencils. Whether it’s with my phone or camera, I capture moments, light, smiles, and textures. Museums, galleries, art shops, yarn shops, beaches, church services… seeing how the moonlight and sunlight illuminates. Seeing how different cultures through time have expressed themselves, in the mundane and mystical.

A while ago, I picked up Cas Holmes’ Stitch Stories, a wonderful compilation of things to try, stitching in journals, collages, more 3D art, and showcasing other artists as well.

Art : Start Where you Are

You don’t have to start with a clear vision. Allow yourself the time and freedom to follow the energy and see where it takes you. Perhaps you add to it over time. About ten years ago, I got into macrame and I knitted several items. I kept one, as I moved around the world. I knitted bright yarn patches into it and I add little souvenirs, like a fabric bird I got on my first trip to Kaua’i. There is the medicine pouch my mom gave me, a tensor coil, and a little acorn ornament from this past Christmas.

This macrame piece now hangs from the window, over a side of my bed, so I can feel the threads, though seeing it blurred when I lay in bed, without contacts and eyeglasses. This piece was intentionally left unfinished, as a reflection of life’s dynamics and how we can let things go. While I was learning macrame, I was reading about string and super string theory. Each time I made a knot, I felt something solidified, made manifest. Yet there is an energy field that is shifting, wave not particle.

In Stitch Stories, one of the artists included is Ann Mechelinck. Her work in the book is called “Release”, a knotted piece of fabrics, upholstery tassels, and jute rope. As part of a 2014 collaborative project between Lithuania’s Vilnius Academy of Arts and Ireland’s CIT Crawford College of Art and Design, the artist chose an item from daily life. From their list of words associated with this item, they chose two. Ann Mechelinck’s were “possession” and “freedom”. The central theme was letting go.

‘Release’ talks about letting go of the ties in our lives that prevent us to feel truly free and questions how free we really are. Why is it that so many people feel imprisoned and pressured by ‘’must have’’, ‘’must do’’, ‘’need to’’, by materialism, by people, by obligations and expectations? This piece translates these feelings in knots that need to be untied and untangled if we want to find that freedom and harmony to grow again.

Ann Mechelinck from her website

Morro Rock, Emulsion Lift of an ocean wave, embroidery experiment (with Lou relaxing on the sofa)

Some of my favourite photographs remain those I took of seeds fallen from a tree near my place. For a few years, I lived on a quiet street just off the very busy East Coast Road in Singapore. At the end of the street is a gate to the park, where I walked Lou and Abby. Just a few steps from the gate is this huge tree. Red seeds in various stages carpeted the grass below. Taking photos of what I see on my walks and when I travel is one thing I really do enjoy.

I’m also a person with pockets full of rocks and pebbles after a day at the beach. Maybe it’s little leaves or twigs from the woods. Paper coasters, napkins, postcards, found papers, maps…

If you’re looking for new techniques to experiment with or inspiration, check out Cas Holmes’ Stitch Stories. There are many poignant stories about us humans, in our environment, our impact, our history, our humanity.