By Marie Despres

On a summer evening before my residency, I stood in the moonlight facing Echinacea purpurea, the flowers aglow suspended in the evening air. This moment in time—my back lit by moonlight, watching lavender-petaled heads floating in the darkness, opening my eyes in awe, illuminated my intention for the Deep Ecology Fellowship. As if I were to breathe in the essence of echinacea and breathe out this luminescent glow into fibers and textiles.

Fast forward many weeks, and I stand facing the yurt after two long days of travel, my breath relaxing as I inhale the scenery and step further away from my vehicle. To my right, at the edge of the forest, I see echinacea growing, and I pause. My memories of that moonlit summer walk embrace me with familiarity, and I smile, eager to experience this new moment’s invitation to slow down to the pace of Goldenseal Botanical Sanctuary. I knew I was in the right place and ready for this phase of my journey as an artist.

My eyes noted the absence of lavender petals, their withered and dried remnants emphasizing the wheel of the year now shifting towards autumn. I turn my inward attention below the soil to the plant’s deep taproots, curiosity shaping my dreamlike state. Symbolic of echinacea’s energies turning inward and below, summer’s death clearing the way for the birth of fall, imprinting each year with the cycles of the changing seasons. The surrounding sanctuary inspires me to seek nourishment beneath the busyness of my daily routine and find refuge here, living amongst the medicine for the next two weeks.

Opening myself to this land shifted my experience of time, and I began to flow through the day easily. My multiple passions—movement, visual art, music making, and writing weave together and fuel one another. My daily rhythm of greeting the plants and forest, opening the day with ceremony, artistic creation, walking the land, enjoying nourishing meals, daydreaming, and music-making shaped those two weeks’ deeply restful contemplative habits. These conditions were perfect for blossoming artistic visions into reality.

The artisan wood tables and the rounded shape of the yurt walls inspired me. It felt like I was outside when I was inside. The first project I started was breathing life into a pair of canvas shoes by covering them in tiny, carefully painted flowers in various colors. My “memory keepers,” these shoes carry the wisdom of my footsteps and time spent in the well-cared-for forest and meadows at the sanctuary. When I wear them, they transport me back to the times I walked along the interpretive trails learning from the plants.

Soon after I settled into the creative rhythm of yurt life, I imagined echinacea asking me how I planned to translate my experience with the plant. I knew I could only answer this question through color and textures by bringing the “song” or unique imprinting I experienced with this plant into form. I sought clues to this answer by pouring over imagery I found in a book that called me from a shelf in the yurt.

The pictures in this botany book appeared to leap off the pages and intertwine themselves with the existing imagery in my mind. I have been fascinated by microscopic imagery since I first saw the tiny worlds moving under the microscope during a science class in 5th grade. The blend of what I see and research informs my artistic process as if these mini-worlds constantly call my being into them. I knew I was ready to begin my project that would become my gift to the sanctuary.

My second project, mask-making, begins by carefully arranging fabrics, gradually embodying echinacea piece by piece. Now in creative flow, my mind and hands become perfectly unified, birthing unseen biological processes to life through vibrant colors. I slowly leave my seat at the raw-edged wood table, careful not to scrape any bark off with excitement, and place the completed mask on my face. Perfectly united, my feet move rhythmically on the ground as I drink in the darkening light through the yurt’s round portal skylight above me. We dance for a long time, echinacea and I, my movement an opportunity to offer prayers and gratitude for our journey together.

In my evening rhythm, listening as insects stitch the edges of summer to fall with their songs, I strum the 5-string Kantele, a traditional Finnish instrument estimated to be 2,000 years old. I recall the lore surrounding this instrument, remembering that every living being cried the first time the Kantele played and that the music drew the forest creatures near. I play through the evenings, curiosity filling me with images of nearby critters listening to the ethereal sounds floating through the nighttime air.

A diverse artistic practice is vital for my creative spirit. One project informs the others; when I hit a block, I am open to more profound expression by transferring to another art form. My abstract work allows my creativity to flow while balancing other projects that require intense focus and encourage my technical skills to expand. My residency taught me that all parts are necessary for a complete artistic process. Goldenseal Botanical Sanctuary taught me to honor and prioritize how I flow with time. This land, stewarded for many years by caring people informed by the plants’ needs, allowed me, as an artist, to drop deeply into a sustained creative flow.

Living amongst the medicinal plants was like having inspirational fuel poured into my being daily. I felt as supported and nourished as these native medicinals, like my beloved echinacea, inhabiting this space. I left the sanctuary completely rejuvenated; my time spent there is something I will never forget, and I hope to visit again sometime soon.

Marie is a United Plant Savers 2022 Deep Ecology Fellowship Artist-In-Residence and a multi-disciplinary artist living in Central Massachusetts. You can follow her artistic journey on Instagram @marieofthemeadow and at www.marieofthemeadow.com.