First step with my Art Journal

Wedgetail Eagle and Three Crows - tangling mid flight above the Pine Forest!

First Step with my Art Journal:

I am very keen on journals and have kept and written in many over the past 40 years.

Now on my journey to develop my Art Therapy career I have started my very first Art Journal instead of a written one.

I am using some tips from "The Art Therapy Source Book" by Cathy Malchiodi.

This first Picture in my art journal is created as follows:

1. Keep your eyes closed

2. Draw scribbles for as long as you can; moving the journal pad around is fine

3. Open your eyes and colour in the picture

4. On the back write a description - just try to accept what comes to you and it does not have to be realistic or even symbolic. Try to tap into what ever inspired you in both stages of scribbling and then coloring. My painting turned out to be inspired a special experience on our morning bush walk. My husband first spotted this Wedgetail Eagle. he was gracefully gliding around. Some Crows were not that happy when he came near and "rushed" him a few times until he moved on. We suspect the crows had a nest very nearby.

I hope you enjoyed and would love to hear any comments.

Kerrie

NOTES:

This Journal is an A4 Sketch Book - the pages are thick (150gsm) and spiral bound which I am finding nice and easy to handle.

The pages are Acid Free.

Dolphin Kick Swimming

Here is my painting (Dolphin Family Mandala) and it shows a family of dolphins kick swimming.

If you like this painting please leave me a comment.

I paint dolphins as a family because that is how I think of them as well as being acrobatic.

This is the bottle nose Dolphin from near Hervey Bay.

To the Butchulla Peoples the Dolphin is a totem animal for many. As the traditional owners from the Wide Bay region the Dolphin is respected and honoured.

Kerrie

The Black Card Course

This is a great course. I did this with my baby sister Manda, in 2014.

BlackCard provides training and consultancy services to enable people and organisations to work effectively with members of the Aboriginal community.

Working with people, not for people, with the genius of Aboriginal Knowledge.

http://www.theblackcard.com.au/

We spent two whole days with these amazing Elders, fellow participants and Mundanara Bayles the Managing Director of Blackcard in beautiful Brisbane.

Lilla Watson and Mary Graham are both amazing women and Educators and have provided a wonderful opportunity for younger generations of First Peoples like myself and non-aboriginal peoples equally to learn from them through these workshops.


Go their website Black Card Courses  to see when the next short courses and intensive two day workshops are running in this year and every year.


Kerrie

Art on Display and for Sale

For enquiries 

Click this Link

or

http://www.kerriethomsen.com/p/art-for-sale.html

NAIDOC WEEK 2015

ART SHOW

St John of God Hospital

Artist Profile

Kerrie is a Butchulla (Badjtala) woman from the peoples of the Maryborough and Tiaro area in QLD where many of her family still live. Her people are the traditional owners and Kerrie expresses the strong ties to the Mary River, the bush and K’gari (Fraser Island) through her painting.

She has a background in healthcare as an Occupational Therapist and still finds time for some art therapy sessions with clients. “As a clinical OT, I always loved my expressive art sessions with patients and I truly believe art making helps people overcome the difficulties of hospitalization, or impact of illness and cope with major treatment programs for e.g. with cancer or dialysis and I want to do a lot more yet in dementia care and bereavement….”

She has been painting for just a few short years.

 “Painting with acrylic on canvas is part of my life now, an expression of my love for nature, my identity, my healing and cultural heritage.”

Her paintings are often of a symbolic and spiritual nature and capture her life   happenings, relationships and culture. “My indigenous style was not learned or planned, it just happened and I feel this flowing through me from my father’s family and our collective dreaming.”

Kerrie has talked about being drawn to walk in the bush and her wish to honour the wonderful land, water and bird animals where she lives and from her childhood.

“Even though I only started to paint at the age of 50, I have always loved looking at all types of art works; in part for the beauty but also for that sense of connection. The act of painting is giving and receiving at the same time and a sense of being one is a really special feeling”.

Kerrie is the Regional manager of Monash University School of Rural health in Bendigo, Indigenous Mentor to the medical students on clinical placement in Bendigo and a member of Indigenous Allied Health Professionals http://iaha.com.au

Painting in acrylic on timber side table.
Featuring Platypus. Colours are the feature to show how special the little Platypus is to me!