Article: Alone Together
Alone Together
Left to right: photo by Krissy Shields, photo by Tanya Lieberman
As summer wanes, I would like to share an experience that made this season especially meaningful. In July, I hosted a four-day long creative retreat for a small group of fellow creatives at my family’s home in southern Vermont, a rambling, off-grid house that is affectionately known as the Farm.
Photo by Alexis Audette
I had long wanted to share the Farm, a quiet, bucolic refuge where one can slow down, soak in the natural world, and achieve a deep level of creative focus, with friends and fellow artists who I felt would find it as restorative and creatively engaging as I do. Also, selfishly, I wanted to re-infuse the Farm with a particular kind of artistic energy. When I was growing up, my grandparents and parents hosted a steady stream of creative visitors. I remember falling asleep to the sound of conversations downstairs about Dutch and Flemish Old Master painters, earth-sheltered architecture, how to customize printing presses... I wanted eclectic creative ideas and reflections to animate the Farm once again.
Photo by Tanya Lieberman
With the belief that sharing work, and how we approach making it, would cultivate perspective, allow ideas to cross-fertilize and build community, I sent the retreat invitation to female creatives of all stripes- ceramicists, photographers, textile designers, choreographers, musicians, furniture designers, installation artists, interior designers, writers, landscape designers- and waited to see who would accept it.
Photo by Tanya Lieberman
The group that materialized included Marteen Allen, a textile designer and creative consultant; Tanya Lieberman, a textile artist, specialist in shibori resist-dyeing techniques, and Chief Consultant for the California State Assembly; Krissy Shields, a theater maker, yoga teacher, and installation artist; Heidi Siegell, a singer, composer/lyricist, and educator; Keita Turner, an interior designer and visual artist, and yours truly.
Clockwise from top left: photo by Krissy Shields, photo by Keita Turner, photo by Krissy Shields, photo by Keita Turner, photo by Tanya Lieberman, photo by Keita Turner
We spent our days independently, working on our own projects, walking in the woods and meadows, swimming in the pond, meditating: finding creative flow. And each night at dinner, we shared different dimensions of our creative journeys with one another. To cultivate conversations that led to meaningful connections and insights, we looked to Priya Parker’s techniques for structuring gatherings and Krista Tippett’s approach to asking life’s big questions. In that spirit, each dinner had a given theme intended to help us explore our artistic practices.
Clockwise from top left: photo by Krissy Shields, photo by Tanya Lieberman, photo by Marteen Allen, photo by Krissy Shields, photo by Tanya Lieberman, photo by Tanya Lieberman, photo by Krissy Shields, photo by Tanya Lieberman.
On the first evening, the theme was about the retreat itself; people shared why they chose to attend a creative retreat and how they intended to spend their time. Answers for why people attended ranged widely, from wanting to create art in community to a desire to say a resounding “yes!” when life opened new doors. Intentions for the retreat (which were realized!) also ran the gamut and ranged from forest bathing to drawing to making dyestuffs from the plants, fungi, and rocks found on the property.
Tanya learned shibori from her aunt in Hawaii, who taught her mostly by correspondence. Tanya would send her aunt samples from California, and her aunt would mail critiques in return. Photo by Tanya Lieberman
On the second evening, we addressed the “what” of our work; what we do and how we came to do it. Discussing our respective practices led to personal origin stories, narratives about how childhood experiences influenced the paths we would follow. These stories had a common denominator: women. We learned how Marteen’s elementary school teacher recognized her artistic talent and made sure she was in classes that would nurture her drawing skills, how Tanya’s aunt taught her traditional shibori resist dyeing techniques, how Krissy’s mother enrolled her in theater groups and attended all of her performances, how Heidi’s mother supported her interest in violin with Suzuki lessons and brushed up her own violin skills so that she could help Heidi practice, how Keita’s mother taught her to paint and encouraged her to go to art school, how my mother made sure that pencils, markers, and sketching paper were on hand throughout my entire childhood. The women who raised us were our first art teachers, the mentors who set us out on our own creative journeys. Art for us began with them.
Left to right: photo by Marteen Allen, photo by Keita Turner
On the third evening we talked about the “how” of our work; how we approach the creative process. This topic yielded a wide variety of responses. Whereas some people would go to a carefully selected quiet place and wait for inspiration to come, others would walk until they “got lost” so that unfamiliar surroundings might deepen inner focus. Focus was a recurring topic, and people shared multiple methods they employed, from guided dance to journaling to sketching, to quiet the noise of the world and find entry points to creative work.
Photo by Marteen Allen
On our last evening, we talked about the “why” of our work. This question elicited two sets of answers, the first of which was common to all of us. This response was that we were hard-wired to create art. Period. Leading a creative life was a calling as opposed to a choice. The second set of answers varied individually and crossed into myriad territories: creative work was a means of preserving the history and culture of our families, a springboard for developing self-awareness within and between individuals, a way to change the narrative about women’s bodies, a means of cultivating engagement with the natural world, a path to finding meaning as we age and our awareness of our mortality grows.
Photo by Tanya Lieberman
The dinner conversations led us to places of deep insight and connection. Likewise, movement sessions set to a propulsive soundtrack of songs about color, led by Krissy, a yoga and Qoya teacher, shook us loose and opened us up. Dancing to Purple Rain, while actual rain pattered on the Farm’s standing seam metal roof, filled me with courage and joy.
Photo by Carol Berner
On the night before the retreat, a harbinger arrived; a bobcat wandered up the driveway and veered off into the meadow. Although bobcats are common in Vermont, they’re very shy and I had never seen one in my life. So, when I saw the bobcat, a creature that weighs up to 35 pounds and has tufted ears and a “bobbed” tail, I felt terror and disbelief. Was it a cat? A dog? A hallucination? After my adrenaline came down and I realized what I was seeing, I began to read about bobcats. Among other things, I learned that bobcats are quiet, vigilant predators whose patience is key to their hunting success.
Photo by Alexis Audette
I think the bobcat was just looking for dinner, but I tend to look for lessons. So, I thought of the bobcat during the retreat when several of us realized that we were having a recurring experience: the sense of looking for something, not seeing it, and then suddenly realizing it was right in front of us. The key was to take a page from the bobcat’s book: to slow down and observe carefully. This is how I found the winged striped maple seeds that I had been looking for. I think it was also the key to the entire retreat: slowing down and carefully observing our surroundings, each other, and ourselves.
Photo by Alexis Audette
As the retreat drew to close, I reflected on how my life as an artist is often solitary, but being in the presence of other creative women made me feel more present, more active in a metaphysical artistic conversation, even as I sketched and worked off by myself. The courage that I felt when I was dancing came from the uplift I felt in the presence of community. I’m grateful to Marteen, Tanya, Krissy, Heidi and Keita; their creative spirits have left an indelible impression on the Farm. What a gift it was to be alone together!
As we enter summer's swansong, may your days be filled with creative exploration alone and in community.