Wayfinding as an artist
I’ve been reading about the human art of wayfinding. How we find our way in the world.
Before maps and machines we learned to navigate our world by noticing. We paid close attention to our instincts. We remembered routes by experience. We found our way by moving through the landscape and being curious, interested, adventurous, attentive.
Wayfinding is part of what makes us human. It is rooted in observation, memory and trust in our ability to figure things out as we go. To get lost and then get ourselves back on the right path or track.
Wayfinding is the perfect analogy for my kind of art making. There is a need to get comfortable with not knowing where I am heading and trusting I can get myself there anyway.
Right now, I’m finding my way through. I am making things. Small studies. A pile of creative bits that are starting to feel like they’re pointing me somewhere interesting, I’m not quite sure where yet.
I’m learning to trust that the clues are already there, embedded in the work. That if I keep making and keep paying attention to what I’m drawn to, the subjects, the shapes, the themes, the colours, the motifs, the marks… they’re saying something, leading me somewhere. I just need to listen to what it is and follow the signs.
It feels like I’m wandering and wondering. Letting ideas evolve and build. Not needing to have a clear sense of direction, yet. Noticing. Following the trail. And allowing whatever it is that wants to emerge to take its time.
I used to find this part extremely hard, the not knowing bit can be uncomfortable. The unfinished-ness of it all. But I’m starting to understand that this is the work. The being in the midst of it all. The being attentive. The making without needing to define or explain or get it right.
Like wayfinding, art-making is its own kind of navigation. Feeling your way forward, marking your own trail, learning the landscape by being in it, up close. With your hands and heart in the process.
So that’s where I am. A little unclear of where this work is heading. A little unfinished. But enjoying the discovery. And trusting that I can figure it out ‘en route’ (on the way)…
PS: If you’re wanting to sharpen your own creative instincts and use the objects in your home to inspire a body of mixed media art you may like my course The Still Life Lab