Healing Arts 2023 – Harbour Gallery Jeresy

It can be wonderful to lose yourself in the cathartic nature and repetition of completing the same movement over and over again. From a mental health perspective, when the hands are busy the mind can often find stillness. Many of the pieces I make exist as a physical manifestation of the need to create a mental comfort from the pursuit of repetitive movement. Jewellery particularly lends itself to repetition, creating the perfect environment for that all elusive mental stillness, that can lead to calm and a soothing of the edges.

Writing about colour itself brings a particular comfort, as when I started the series of essays, prompted by a body of work created for the Gate House Gallery in Guernsey in 2017, I realised that colour was a huge part of my artistic journey, and something that I clung to in times of confusion or need. Interesting that I hadn’t previously realised this, and I hadn’t intended to write, but once I started, the floodgates well and truly opened. It then dawned on me that I attributed colours to the people around me, and perhaps unknowingly used my perception of the colour as a means of attempting to understand the person. The exploration of colour through my nearest and dearest has led to a greater understanding of self, and has proved to be a cathartic and healing process.