Patricia Van Asperen
Great Lakes
How do we reconnect with this basic element beyond the "resource" aspects that define consumer culture?
How do we creatively move through grief using artistic ritual?
This is a psychological experiment that blends clinical viewpoints with the skills of artists as guides in healing from a significant loss.
What we are beginning to realize is that our traumatic experiences are, in fact, stored in the body, and healthy healing simply can’t be accessed on an entirely intellectual level. As this is the case, what does the individual need to be able to process these emotional connections that we can’t reach by means of our higher brain functions? Can this be appreciated by our scientific and logic seeking culture?
Who better than artists, and their art-making rituals, to show the way.
What speaks to our souls, what makes living along the water extraordinary?
“If the rivers of Canada can be described as the veins of our existence, then would not the heart of the Canadian natural system be the great sweetwater inland seas, known as the Great Lakes? How is that heart doing?”
As an emerging artist particularly in Ontario, I feel my roots along this province’s waterways more strongly then ever. Though raised along the shores of the Great Lake Basin, I have had very little perspective of how important these lakes are to our understanding of our place in the world.
