From There, You’re Free – The Psychic Architecture of Spring

It’s always a quiet relief when spring arrives, isn’t it? A kind of reassurance. The evidence of life returns – though we’d seen no sign of it for months. No proof, no promise. And yet, it was there all along. Rooted. Waiting. Responding not to pressure but to the right conditions.

There’s something quietly psychoanalytic about that rhythm. About trusting in what lies latent, in what cannot be forced. We can’t dig up a bulb to check for roots without killing it. We can’t open the oven door again and again without losing the rise. The work of becoming – whether that’s the becoming of an artist, an entrepreneur, or simply a human being – is not helped by constant interference. There is a discipline in not pushing the river. A necessary surrender.

We hold faith, often without evidence. That’s what the seasons teach. That abundance returns, not quickly, but cyclically. And for those further along in the journey, there’s sometimes the retrospective sense that even the pivots, the detours, the dry spells, were in service of something. Redirection as reformation.

So perhaps spring reminds us: Get in touch with the essence of a thing. Let it do its thing. Get out of the way.

I’ll admit, there’s no central focus to this newsletter – no single announcement. But maybe that’s apt. As I mentioned earlier in the week, the gallery has been intentionally streamlined. There’s clarity now. A quiet holding. So browse as you’re drawn. Let the work guide you.

Lately I find myself drawn to shapes that contain. That hold. Perhaps that’s a reflection of where I’ve been: cutting back in order to hold the centre of the gallery. And beyond the gallery, I think we all have to ask – what is it we hold onto when things are stripped back? What values anchor us? Without them, something collapses. Not always visibly. Sometimes, quite the opposite. But inside, we know. There’s a dislocation, a quiet alienation.

In psychoanalytic terms, it’s a kind of structural work – paring back to get to the essence of the self, of a life, of a garden. Organising, as analysts might say. When they speak of a person as “organised,” it means something essential: not fixed, but steady – as far as being can ever be static. Organised in a psychic sense. Able to be a presence to oneself and to others. And from there, something becomes possible. Once you’ve made space – once you’re holding the centre – you can choose what to place inside. What to grow. The centre holds, and the container forms.

Because from there, you’re free, aren’t you? Free to follow your leads, to follow the nudges, to respond to the weather.

 

Below are a few pieces I’ve chosen to include – works that, to me, reflect that same spirit: of containment, expansiveness, and the quiet organisation of something true..