It was almost 20 years between paintings for Heather Bradbury.
“I had always loved drawing and making things. When I went to Uni I studied a graphic design course, which was all done by hand back then, no computers. But once I began working, I didn’t paint for years,” she explains.
Having worked as a graphic designer for a number of years, the mother of four gave it all up to use her creativity in mission work. After pouring her energy into media promotions and production as part of this work, she found herself unwell and burnt out and needed to slow right down.
During a Sabbatical year, she helped run a Christian Artist’s Retreat. It was there she decided to give painting another go.
Heather’s first painting ‘Blessings’
“I started painting this tiny picture, about 10cm big, and it worked out OK, so I thought, I’ll get a bigger canvas from out in the hall. Then I painted a big leaf with a droplet of water on it. When I’d finished, everyone just went “Wow!” I didn’t even know I could paint.”
Noticing her obvious talent, a friend encouraged her to get her artwork valued. Heather couldn’t believe it when she was told what it was worth. “I thought, ‘You’re joking!’”
It was a signal to herself that she was doing something God had gifted her to do, and it gave her confidence to keep painting. But more than that, she felt God drawing her to the canvas. At a time in her life when she needed to slow down, painting provided an ideal creative and reflective outlet.
“The first painting I did had this huge water droplet, and it was about how God just brings blessing, how eventually, it drops, the blessings always come. I’ve learnt that God will bless, even though it feels like life is challenging, which it was. At the time, my friends around me kept saying ‘no, God is going to bless you, he really is.’ And I kept going, ‘yeah, sure.’ But he does.”
‘Forgiven’, finalist in the Glover.
Heather decided to enter her third painting into the 2013 Glover Prize, Australia’s richest annual landscape painting prize. Much to her surprise, her work ‘Forgiven’ was shortlisted. A painting of two feet standing in a mountain creek, the work features her signature element: water.
“Water seems to be the thing,” she says. “Each time I go to paint something else, God brings me back to this.”
Her latest work, called ‘Restoration’, is also a painting of a creek bed, based on Psalm 23:2 “He leads me beside still waters”. For Heather, painting has been a way of processing suffering, as well as the path through it.
“Art encourages you to be childlike. For me it’s a place where it’s just me and God and no one else is in that space. It helps bring healing and it helps bring peace.”
Heather is hoping to share the joy of creativity given by her Creator at an upcoming workshop she’s running with friend and National Director of Christian Artist’s Factory, MarDee Kaylock. The two women collaborated recently to create Brush with the Creator, a book of Heather’s paintings and Dee’s words. The workshop, which will be held at the Tramsheds in Launceston, Tasmania on July 18-19, begins with a contemplative retreat on the Friday, moving into a creative workshop on the Saturday.
“The first day is about connecting with God, coming from the busyness of life and going ‘Where am I? What am I doing?’ And just breathing God in. Then the second day we will be exploring creativity in your community, using what you have; creating using nature to inspire, changing atmospheres, discovering your place of influence, mixed in with some creative activities..”
“I’m hoping that like it has for me, being creative will bring them closer to God, to peace and healing.”
Brush with the Creator workshop is on in Launceston, Tasmania, July 18-19. For more information, visit www.brushwiththecreator.com For more of Heather’s artworks, visit her personal website.
Email This Story
Why not send this to a friend?
