Creative Connections
This is a long overdue article to celebrate a creative connection made in the peak of lockdown through shared values, ideals for equality and recognition of the importance of women supporting women. I first came across Julia Mai’s artwork within a female led space on social media. Julia’s work stood out to me with it’s vibrant greens and wonderful depictions of the female form, her skills with a pencil and paintbrush are outstanding. Her use of colour is wonderful and I was also particularly drawn to her humorous character, Frank Castillo, none other than The Grumpy Old Moon.
Julia Mai is a Swedish born artist who, at the time our paths crossed, lived in Berlin, Germany. Julia and I connected through private messages and quickly found ourselves discussing big important topics, including politics, human rights and our ideas for changing the world through creativity. Back in the early days of developing our first Arts Council bid, Julia offered plenty of moral support and agreed to provide us some artwork for The Art of Self Care, to help us explore the theme of Reflection. Many patient months passed before I could finally share the news that we had been awarded a grant and we could now begin the process of turning our ideas into reality.
By this point, Julia had moved to another beautiful part of the world, Reykjavík, Iceland and was involved in a variety of other projects. Through our connection on social media, I was able to have an insight into life in Reykjavík, from bathing in hot springs, to the prolonged daytime darkness, the epitome of Hygge and the truly majestic Northern Lights.
Julia began to explore the theme of Reflection through her own experiences, incorporating a difficult period of personal grief and drawing on her own deep felt emotions.
Julia’s work forms a series of six paintings showing the different stages of The Reflective Cycle by Graham Gibbs (1988).
You can see her wonderful work in our free Reflective Journal which encourages gentle introspection and self care.
If you’d like to see more of what Julia gets up to, including Artists 4 Ukraine, you can follow her socials here.
Artists 4 Ukraine is an amazing charity initiative raising funds for Ukraine following the invasion. The project has so far raised over 7,000,000 ISK - just under £40,000. Amazing!
Its been an absolute pleasure to get to know Julia and to be able to work together on such an important project. I look forward to seeing what else she has in store for us in the future.
Lauren Thortify
