Creative nest is a welcoming non-judgemental place where you can set intentions and goals, nurture your creativity and free yourself to explore in great company.

It is the beginning of a new year and the perfect time to bring focus to what you wish to create in your life: whether that is starting a regular creative practice such as writing, drawing painting or gardening, completing a novel, giving time to try out some new creative explorations you are curious about or simply nourishing your heart by giving time for creative play.

This can all be done simply and with fun and lightness whether it is to bring joy for a few moments a day or to spark a powerful positive change.

Come along to create, connect, inspire and transform in supportive weekly online studio spaces. Creative nest continues on Thursday mornings and I am adding a new class on Tuesday evenings, both within the comfort of your own home.

These are spaces for beginners and experienced creative folk alike and are beautiful opportunities to engage your head, hand and heart, using movement, music and meditation allowing you to re-centre your body, re-focus your mind and inspire your creative practice.

Life is a journey not a destination so let it be a creative one. Begin now!

TUESDAY EVENING CREATIVE NEST

Beginning Tuesday 12^th January at 7:30pm – 9:00pm GMT

TO JOIN TUESDAY EVENING SESSIONS PLEASE REGISTER AT THIS LINK

THURSDAY MORNING CREATIVE NEST

Beginning again on Thursday 14^th January 10:00am-11:30am GMT

TO JOIN THURSDAY MORNING SESSIONS PLEASE REGISTER AT THIS LINK

• After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the session.
• Suggested payment for these classes is on a sliding scale between €10 – €20 per session. You can use Paypal at this link or bank transfer (just ask and I will send on bank details). My intention is to make this space available and welcoming to everyone so if you are on a low income and need to pay a lower amount for a while please message me to arrange. 
• Please take time beforehand to prepare any materials you might need to work, clear a space so that you can focus on one project. Dress comfortably, have water or a cup of tea ready and ensure that your phone is on airplane mode.
•  You are welcome to join the session 10mins before it starts so you can check that Zoom is working OK for you and so that we can start together on time.

 With gratitude

Sinéad

Batch No.2: Sets of 20 eco postcards

I searched for the best methods possible for producing and sending these lovely postcards: They are prints of my watercolours, printed on 100% recycled card, with vegetable based ink and in an environmentally friendly printing process.
For delivery I send them off in 100% recycled kraft paper with paper tape in recycled plastic free envelopes. I am so delighted with them: they are little gems of joy, and are as kind to our mama earth as I can manage. I’m always looking for more sustainable (environmentally, socially, economically and culturally) ways of producing my art so that it is not only inspiring visually but through the creative and making process.

Its been a while since I posted here as I’ve been using my Eco-community-journey blog. You can find out about this project and journey of mine by following this link: http://letscreate.sineadcullen.com/

I started out in October 2016 and at the moment I’m in the south of Spain in a beautiful community called Los Portales, which is my seventh eco-community so far. My plan is to continue exploring these amazing communities and sharing my experience of them in the hope of inspiring small (or large) changes in peoples lives that create better ways of living. My next steps include travelling to Angsbacka in Sweden: a community which runs many inspiring workshops and courses and for the summer runs back to back inspiring festivals. I will be volunteering there at a number of festivals including GEN Europe’s (the Global Eco-village Network of Europe’s) annual gathering which is what drew me to this community in the first place,  and I will be working on the design of some new buildings (which I’m very excited about!). After my time in Sweden I have the opportunity to travel to Colombia for 4-6 months to visit communities there and to work with a wonderful architect there learning to build with bamboo and working on the re-construction of some communities in Ecuador that were badly damaged in recent earthquakes. This whole project is such a heart calling for me and the work in Colombia is so aligned with the work I know I am here in this life to offer.

For this project of exploring eco-communities I had the idea to fund it in a few creative ways: by selling pieces of my art and by gathering support from the internet community via crowd funding. I am still raising funds for these next steps and am making a call out for contributions for my crowd-funding which is almost two thirds of the way to completion or to those who would like to purchase some of my work. You can donate to my crowd-funding campaign here: https://www.gofundme.com/LetsCreate and you can look at the work I have for sale here: http://www.sineadcullen.com/index.php/for-sale/

I hope you can join me through making a donation, by purchasing some lovely prints or paintings and  by following me on my blog. Thank you for reading.

The image below is of a painting made during my journey while I was in Eco-Dharma: a gorgeous Buddhist community in the Catalan Pyrenees recently sold piece that will soon be winging its way to Germany!

‘Eco-Dharma No.1 2017’ 28cm x 36cm 300gsm Watercolour paper (unframed)

Movement Medicine Classes

Friday Dec 9^th and 16^th drop-in Movement Medicine classes exploring the theme of connection, to self, other, community and environment.

7:30pm-9:30pm Newbold house, 111 St Leonards Road Forres,  IV36 2RE, Scotland.

Human communities have always come together with their own beats and rhythms to dance, sing and tell stories, celebrating life and calling in dreams for their future generations. Movement Medicine is another way to do this; it is a form of conscious dance that allows us to re-connect with ourselves, and our unique creativity, and to explore life around us as a co-creator. These classes are open to anyone with a curiosity to dance and explore in a safe and fun environment.

Sinéad is a Movement Medicine Teacher, an artist and an environmental architect. Her work focuses on what it is that connects us with our creative potential, with one another and with our planet. Her classes and workshops she explores aspects of the creative process; allowing movement to be a catalyst for greater awareness of, and greater access to, your unique creative expression.

“Dance connects us – with our bodies, with our souls, with each other, with the space within and around us and with the spirit of life. It gives us breathing space away from the noise of our busyness. In that space we come into deeper alignment with ourselves and our own intuitive knowledge….Once we enter the flow of our movement we learn to trust the natural creativity of the life force inside us.” Susannah and Ya’Acov Darling Khan The School of Movement Medicine

This work counts as prerequisites for the Apprenticeship Programme and Professional Training with The School of Movement Medicine.

For information you can contact Sinéad by email on sinead.a.cullen@gmail.com

https://www.facebook.com/connectcreateinspirestransform/

From the beginning of October 2016 I have started a year long journey of visiting and learning form eco-communities. This journey was inspired by recent time spent over the summer in Irelands first Eco-village in Cloughjordan and in the UK’s oldest Eco-village in the Findhorn Foundation, Scotland. In both communities I recognised them as places where I could offer my skills as an artist, architect and teacher in ways that I felt were more like co-creation; ways that felt deeply rewarding and were closer to the sense of truly giving and receiving of gifts and learning that were mutually beneficial. I am curious about the positive impacts we can have in our lives and in the world around us when we create and work together. So I am dedicating this year to offering and learning form eco-communities and sharing my experiences along the way in the hope that they will inspire positive eco-living opportunities in your life too.

You can find out more about my journey and support me from my GoFundMe site: https://www.gofundme.com/LetsCreate and you can read about my experiences as I travel from my new blog: http://letscreate.sineadcullen.com/

It was great to see my work up on the walls in The Niland Gallery in Galway amongst the work of Ben Gabriel, Colin Grehan, Dunleavy Bespoke, Joe Hogan, Patricia Murphy, Raymond Kingham, Shane Holland, Shona Slemon, Stephen O’Briain, and Stephen Quinn.
 

Some images of explorations inspired by time in the Burren: how the Irish relate to our land. Some of this work will feature in an upcoming publication by Benetton on contemporary Irish art.

In early 2014, on a journey with the Pachamama Alliance, I spent a few weeks with the Achuar and Sapára tribes in the rainforests of Ecuador. My time there was a humbling opportunity to get an insight into a way of life that is deeply respectful of the individual within community, and within a world view that honours the interconnection of all life. Through stories, meals and ceremony we shared very different perspectives of the same world. I learned that their sense identity is intrinsically linked to the forest that they live with: there is no place where the forest ends and they begin; they are the very roots, branches and leaves of its over all alive-ness.

Raíces Del Mundo means roots of the world and came from a sketch I made there, feeling a sense of the lightness, simplicity and freedom in connection, acknowledging that our actions have a ripple effect on one another and the living system within which we exist. The sense of connection felt dynamic and alive in a way that felt mutual, and liberated me temporarily from the isolation that I clothe myself in, in order to ‘survive’ in our modern world.

The painting is part of my project with Jo Cummins​ and Mathias Baumann​. This is a link to the first part of our mini documentary series: Documentary Part 1