Creating a new world with art and empathy
Creative activism is a fun way to create change. My new 'Empathy Series' gets underway this week.
Hello friends, I’m making new art that expresses how I feel about what’s important to cultivate more of in our world, starting right here in the USA. Creative activism is fun and healing, and soon my yard will be filled with signs of it.
Read on for my latest article.
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Thank you for being here, I always appreciate you for showing up.
Love, Kris
Creating a new world with art and empathy
We all have the ability and the power to change this world, for the better.
At the beginning of 2025, I woke up one day thinking I wanted to make a new series of paintings called The Empathy Series. I could clearly imagine it, the colors and style came to me quickly.
I imagined it as wall art, paintings, richly colored and patterned. I’ve been making paintings that are more textured and patterned since the end of last year. Doing so has been helping me find my way into this new series.
Since January 20, 2025, we have all been deluged with a series of non-stop energetic challenges, and not just in the USA. I didn’t get around to making an actual painting in this series, until yesterday. But even when the news got scarier, and the energy heavier, my idea didn’t leave me. If anything, it became stronger and more insistent.
And then the sun started coming back - people are rising up in these United States, and optimism, community, and cooperation are showing up. It’s time to reclaim Empathy.
Yesterday it was time to begin painting these new pieces, and so I did.
Whenever I start a new series of paintings, I work in my paint journal first. I can practice my ideas, experiment, find my colors, and try different ways of mark making to reach what I want to have.
I imagined a yellow to gold to orange background, with a floral motif, and letters in a rich pink to red color. So I started to experiment to see what worked best. Happily, my inner magpie recently insisted that I buy a bunch of new stencils, bigger ones. They turned out to be perfect for this new work.
The flower stencil below helped me create the patterned background easily, I just kept layering it with variations of yellow to gold to orange to create depth and interest.
My Empathy painting is created on a plastic corrugated lawn sign that I originally purchased as a blank sign, complete with metal stand. My husband and I made a Harris & Walz sign last fall on this blank sign.
For the Empathy painting, I painted over this side of the election sign with a light yellow to cover up the former piece. I used acrylic paint, which I realize isn’t the best paint for a long lasting sign, but that’s okay for now.
I plan to make a LOT MORE of this kind of yard art, and place it all over my yard and garden.
The Empathy series will be adding new works soon, some as yard art, many as wall art. My next step is to create another Empathy painting, on canvas this time. So many lovely concepts and energetic spells for future works: Trust, Love, Joy, Compassion, Optimism, Imagination, Truth, Peace, Abundance, all come to mind immediately.
This work makes me happy for so many reasons. I find myself inspired by the paintings of Kehinde Wiley, the work of artist Nick Cave, and the fiber artist Bisa Butler, as well as my years of working with fabrics and textiles. I don’t know where this will take me but I am going to go there happily.
My wish for this series is to see more people starting to make their own colorful yard art. Go ahead - make a sign or a sculpture or something to express how you’re feeling in this changing world! What kind of images would you like to see?
This Week’s Inspiration: Creative Peaceful Non-Violent Actions Work
I plan to participate in this economic boycott on Friday, February 28, and I encourage you to do the same.
Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world all at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach... One of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world is to stand up and show your soul. Soul on deck shines like gold in dark times. The light of the soul throws sparks, can send up flares, builds signal fires, causes proper matters to catch fire. ~ Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes
Thank you for reading!
Thank you for being here, and please do share with anyone you know who would enjoy my work. Cheers to you! Love, Kris