Creative Trigger #3: Nature

This post is the third in a weekly series on personal creative triggers: places, people or things from which I draw creative or artistic inspiration. Week 1. Week 2.

OK it's hardly original, but it's still worthy of its own post here because there's no denying it's one of my creative triggers. But how can I possibly reduce Mother Nature's creative inspiration to a bulleted list?

I won't try to include it all. I'll tackle only a fraction and focus on a few ways Mother Nature triggers creativity in my small world of visual art with the hopes that you'll find something valuable to your specific medium or practice. Here goes:

1) Nature's textures, colours and composition provide fodder for painting and photography. Think lines, patterns and colour juxtapositions for abstracts; vistas with mountains, water and sky for landscapes; and don't forget the birds and the bees - literally.

stillness reflected

fortuitous photo fluke of autumn colours

ice patterns with negative effect

2) Following the lead of shadows and sunlight (see week 2), nature exercises the imagination. Have you ever caught yourself cloud gazing or building fairy houses in the woods? Or maybe you see hidden shapes and images in the bark of a tree, the textures of a rock or the curves of a pepper?

3) Finally, nature instills the humility and stillness necessary for me to return to my Centre and connect with, among other things, my creative essence. Although not directly related to the canvas, the restorative qualities of nature do wonders for my spirit which in turn feeds my creative process. A hike in the woods or an afternoon by the sea can be the ultimate Artist Date.

Et voilà, three ways Mother Nature inspires my artistic play.

Sometimes obvious, sometimes subtle, Mother Nature's subjects are as endless as the artistic visions through which she is honoured. Surely she inspires in more ways than those captured here.

How does nature inspire you in your creative practice? Tell me. Show me.