What do I do when I'm ashore during a long sea kayak expedition? Apart from the usual chores of cooking, eating and planning for the next day, there is often plenty of time to walk, explore and be creative - make art.
Landscape art is one of my passions. In particular I find the work of
Andy Goldsworthy a wonderful inspiration for me. I am not a trained artist but I love to dabble with water colour landscape painting and I like to create pieces of landscape art whenever I can. This usually involves arranging foliage, items I have found on the beach or forming stones and rocks into spirals and patterns. I also love to collect sea glass - the broken pieces of old glass bottles that have been tumbled by the waves so they end up smooth and rounded - and for a few years I made these into jewellery that I sold.
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| Sea glass, Cromarty beach |
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| Hand made silver wire sea glass bracelet. |
Experiencing the natural world as I do, I cannot help but be inspired to express myself when I'm exploring my camp environs on a long summer evening. I find the process to be thought provoking and in some ways restorative. Even if no one else will see what I create, I feel that I have expressed my thoughts and feelings of the moment and that I may have soothed a worry or a concern. Indeed in years gone by I offered the opportunity to create art out in nature as a facilitative tool in my outdoor personal development and therapeutic work. It often evoked powerful insights for the people I was guiding.
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| Created by Donja, Pabbay, 2013 |
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| Pabbay, natures art |
Being an advocate of
leave no trace, the philosophy and practice of passing through the landscape with as minimum an impact as possible, I always dismantle any piece of land art that I have created, or leave it in the certain knowledge that the next high tide will do this work for me. This way I know that what I have made is not a permanent fixture, but simply an expression of an important and unique moment in my life as I journey through the wild world that I love.
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Best wishes, Nick.