The Day – Artist and writer friends collaborate on book of ‘Nature Meditations in Word and Watercolor’

As longtime friends and inventive souls, Judy Benson and Roxanne Steed had been discussing teaming up on a book for some time. Benson, a writer who lives in New London, and Steed, an artist who’s a Mystic resident, have a shared appreciation for the outside that appeared ideally suited subject material.

“We both love hiking, we both love nature and the environment. It’s a real connecting thing in our friendship. So to have this book as a physical form (from which) other people could share the ideas and images was really exciting for me,” Steed says.

Some of the items mirror on components of nature like dawn (Steed’s impressionistic picture units a small burst of yellow inside browns, tans and purples representing bushes and floor) and seashore (a portray of a lady, standing ankle-deep in the surf, lifts a small little one).

Other segments embrace references to native locations, with stunning photographs and evocative, typically poetic prose accompanying. A section titled “Dirt Road,” from Bluff Point State Park in Groton, describes how “honeysuckle blossoms scented the air that day, and buttercup flowers glowed in the sun,” and a bit a couple of journey to Harkness Memorial State Park in Waterford describes whitecaps wanting playful, “like foamy balls of energy rising out of the depths to tickle the breeze before ducking back under.”

The outdoors world, of course, finds its method into these forays into nature. Benson writes about an exquisite bullfrog refrain at Mitchell Woods and the way it sparked her to consider the person voices on the BLM protests likewise converging “into a force of wonder and inspiration.”

The pandemic turns into an ever-looming presence, notably in the course of the spring, when friends operating into one another at a state park inevitably talk about masks and individuals they know who’ve contracted COVID-19. “Stay safe” is a chorus.

So is the concept of discovering refuge from the pandemic in nature.

“I really think that reflecting back on that first year, that first few months, that first pivot we all had to do … there are lessons to be learned that can really be valuable,” Benson says.

A supply of recreation and calm

Working on this mission in the course of the first half of the pandemic was invaluable to Benson and Steed as nicely.

“Having a creative outlet at that time was, for me, really a great anchor. It gave you a sense you could get something meaningful out of this chaos,” Benson says.

Steed felt she needed to get outdoors, and she turned extremely conscious of how essential state parks and regional parks are. She observed that extra individuals had been utilizing and craving these out of doors areas.

“I think there will always be things that are huge stressors to people, but I think uniformly it’s nature and the thought of preserving nature that will probably always be a big relief. It’s like humans need this space and they need moments of beauty and calm and quiet in their lives that they can seek out. We got to witness people actually doing that. I was amazed at how many more people used these public spaces for recreation and calm,” Steed says.

Benson notes that, for just a few months, she thought the book would lose its relevance. But with the pandemic nonetheless ongoing, that’s not the case.

A wonderful collaboration

Benson and Steed had labored collectively earlier than on a gallery present and an exhibit on the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Headquarters in Hartford.

Benson is the communications coordinator for Connecticut Sea Grant and editor of its biannual journal, “Wrack Lines.” She can also be a former well being and atmosphere reporter for The Day.

Steed is an artist and trainer whose work has been present at galleries throughout the nation.

Their “Earth and Sky” collaboration kicked off throughout an early 2020 weekend on the retreat/training heart Incarnation Center in Deep River.

They returned the middle in the autumn of 2020, which they notice was a pleasant technique to shut the mission.

Because of the pandemic, Benson and Steed needed to change how they approached the work. They tended to have impartial experiences outside and then so much of lengthy cellphone conversations about them earlier than they finally joined up for, say, a jaunt at Hammonasset Beach State Park in Madison in the course of the summer season. 

Of the sections for “Earth and Sky,” a couple of third every had been impressed first by writing; had been impressed first by portray; and had been developed collectively.

Steed’s artwork in the book is extensive-ranging, and deliberately so. There are sketchbook works and extra painterly renditions. She went summary on a portray of needle ice, for example, feeling the type would higher mirror that phenomenon. 

The significance of nature and creativity

Benson says she hopes readers of “Earth and Sky” “will find it to be a focus for their own meditation, reflection and creative expression, however they want to do that. There are many ways you can do that — you can do journaling, you can do sketchbooking. Something I’ve been doing recently that I’ve been enjoying as a nice creative outlet is something called contemplative nature photography,” Benson says. For contemplative nature pictures, she takes undoctored photographs of issues which might be fascinating to her and then writes about them.

Steed says she hopes that the book would possibly encourage individuals to do their very own sketchbook and to start out on a inventive journey.

She says, “I think our creative side is a really important part of our humanity, whether it comes in the form of writing or painting or cooking or whatever we do as a creative outlet. I think those outlets we choose are really important for our health and sanity. We really find in times of isolation like this last two years of weirdness how important nature, creativity, all those things are.”