Studio | Early Futures

pigments

Ochre Sanctuary
Studio
Workshops + Talks
Book of Earth
About
Contact

heidilynnheidilynn

my box of drawing rocks/crayons i bring with me wh

my box of drawing rocks/crayons i bring with me when i travel away from home 🤍 it makes me v happy just to look at them.

friday play day with local cascadia soils. plus sk

friday play day with local cascadia soils. plus skulls.

sad to hear fellow pigment devotee Dr. Jill Mellic

sad to hear fellow pigment devotee Dr. Jill Mellick passed a few weeks ago. see @opus_archives recent homage post. her work documenting and psychoanalyzing psychologist Carl Jung's pigment use in his fantastical Red Book is strange and matter obsessive and I am grateful to have learned from her work in her own book, The Red Book Hours and from exchanging words and dust with her. My favorite thing she discovered was how Jung used a toxic green pigment as a functional paint to protect his wooden book stand from wormrot, and as a spritual paint to color his visions and snakes. Thank you Jill for all you gave us 🤍

(photos from @opus_archives post and the red book hours)

#theredbook #carljung #jillmellick #opusarchives

people occasionally like to ask me "what do you do

people occasionally like to ask me "what do you do" with the pigments you make/gather? idk. not my favorite question. for a lot of reasons im not gonna get into right here. but, yes! i do paint. i love painting. tho "scim" is probably the more specific term for what i do. from irish, "a thin coating of tiny particles like a limewash on a house or dust on a mantlepiece," "a fairy film that covers the land," "succumbing to the supernatural world through sleep."...

if you too secretly wonder wtf i do with pigments, heres a glimpse at what i am up to: my longterm vision (which many of my close ones know well) has always been to build/sculpt a big earth structure... i wont keep the pigments or rocks or carry them in a drawer or museum-like "archive" but give their counsel true space in a stone relic hall, columbarium, pigeonairre, charnal or spirit or arcosolia tower -- there are a lot of words for this type of building -- where many ochres exist together in a magnetizing prayer.

itll take some years. and a lot of scimming! and i might ask for your help eventually. but you can always imagine/trust me to be over here when im not sharing a lot, doing the oracle art asked of me, making offerings/studies/sketches towards this indelible earth....🖤

foraged a few joys from this closing spin cycle ro

foraged a few joys from this closing spin cycle round the sun!! 🎇

earth + hands x 2 places

earth + hands x 2 places

😍 there are many ochre workers i meet while tea

😍 there are many ochre workers i meet while teaching workshops, that now i am grateful to call friends and collaborators!! @elpitha i loved reading yr recent article about the evolution of your work in @swcontemporary ... really feels like we are there with you!

go read/see more via link in my stories!
some v sweet photos of earth.

photo here by elpitha tsoutsounakis

wanna guess the pigments?? 🫐🧊🛢🌊 ill ma

wanna guess the pigments?? 🫐🧊🛢🌊 ill make this one easier by showing both pigment & raw earth form and doing blues which are generally limited as minerals. if you miraculously can name where the pigments are from i give yu extra extra extra cred.

this is the kind of intro training i teach and find essential to gain awareness around how quickly knowledge of material and place can be forgotten when it comes to making color...

have fun!!! its a snow day here so im off to go out and look at animal tracks 🐾👣

***UPDATE. some answers are in my stories today****

anybody need some rock 👁 candy?? heres a few i

anybody need some rock 👁 candy?? heres a few i found in my desktop sweep-up pile... just to say hellllo while i conjur some pigment guessing games for us to play here soon

amazing pigments from so many beautiful artists &

anybody need a pigment talisman?? these early ochr

anybody need a pigment talisman?? these early ochre finger pressings i made have been guarding over my work and rock kin here for years. they are ready to fly to new places. & i need to make space for artwork and realms to come this winter. if you wld like to welcome one into your space or onto your altar (or for someone special), id love to get them to good homes.

⋒ 🜞◬UPDATE: these all found their new places! thnx everyone! ⩄ 🜜♡

ll take offerings of ca$h ($26 -108 sliding scale & if you live far away from me, you cover shipping) and let me pick what to send you based on divination. dm me the name of who its for, a mailing address and send paypal heidi@earlyfutures.com or venmo: hidealot to reserve.

earth pigments over pyritic coal on h20 papier about the size of my hand.
no binders
all blessings

microbial primal iron ooze, speckled soil, basalt

microbial primal iron ooze, speckled soil, basalt weathered red x2, sky mud, a few examples of ochre homes i saw this past week while doing coastal work that required stormy oceans 🌋🌊

swung by @wildpigmentproject & @prayersforwhatis s

swung by @wildpigmentproject & @prayersforwhatis studios last week and it melted my heart 🍂

i love thedarkmountainproject and their publicatio

i love thedarkmountainproject and their publications (like their manifesto "Uncivilization"!), so am honored to be a part of their new gorgeous offering!! my fellow pigment worker @catalina.christensen and i collaborated on a conversation with pigments and paintings (and a few other words)... and we are alongside her fellow @wildernessartcollective folks and an amazing spring tending story by @foundandground and even a piece by former local Bellingham poet friend @artofcompost && many others. zoom launch party tomorrow for anyone who wants to come. ill put the link in my stories 🤲🏽

two shades of alchemical mortifactio. both white a

two shades of alchemical mortifactio. both white and blue vivianite muck will change to dark midnight sky or even black eventually.... and might go through green and yellow phases on the way! truly a transformative ochre to learn from 😱

things in circles doin what they do in here & a gi

things in circles doin what they do in here & a giant bouquet i made from @debragoldmanstudio healthy garden

news from the neighborhood...they are digging up a

news from the neighborhood...they are digging up a field to the peat and then clay layer thats below 🤤... swooping up some of that before it gets hauled away to the soil graveyards. saw a sweet buried fire changin the soil red. then saw this article so gotta go listen and fight for circular economy wastewater facilities at city council...plus... i love when soil self-combustion makes the local headlines. (the full headline is cutoff in my screenshot and says "spontaneous combustion of soil from a flowerpot scorches washington home")

revisiting this soil rainbow from iran's "red" isl

revisiting this soil rainbow from iran's "red" island today...while reading @emergencemagazine interview "beings seen and unseen" with amitav ghosh which is a good read for those of us who relate to nonhumans as teachers ~~~~

whoa. this offering I made is actually gonna roam

whoa. this offering I made is actually gonna roam the earth!!! 😳 🜜⋒◬⩄ 🜞 & while I’m still gasping for air and a little unsure how to feel…. i am grateful that she is comin out so so gorgeous and core and am overwhelmed that misshapen pearl bb is going to be born alive in this challenging worldtime, with shell and tooth and claws intact!!! ( thanks to the dedicated team at @abramsbooks !! and bless to heartwarming cover collab with empathic seer Chiara Zonca @shadowontherun ).

welcome to this side, iron👁eyed one of the many!!🎊

preorder is already open (!??) in early futures style (birthday is spring '23). i put the link above. please go say hello!! save a copy for yr own hands or ask yr library or local gem bookstore to order for you. I would be very honored and love to feel your support of this work and/or help spread the word...

will say much more soon… for now, happy to share the first light news here, since I have so many of you to individually thank for yr wisdom, images, dialogue, compassion, curiosity....

(((also.... I got a vision to slip handmade secret divination cards (ala Brian Eno’s Oblique Strategies style) inside the pages for friends and fam and anyone who preorder (a rust song? a muck-stained receipt for fuel? cosmic letter pressed sayings? pressed spider webs? actual rock crumbs?) but that’s all ill say on that r n... what do yu think? a good idea??)))

#bookofearth

detail from ª portal (see earlier post)... i love

detail from ª portal (see earlier post)... i love watching earth and water settle and hum while ive been thinking of my best spiritual friend steven-la who died 2 years ago this time of year (or "changed realms" as some would say) and wishing i cld transport thru this faux mandala to hang out with his spirit in the ol lapis den 🙏🏼

(this blue isnt lapis lazuli tho, its vivianite from a couple local coasts)

Load More Follow on Instagram

© Early Futures 2009-2052

Newsletter

First Name

Last Name

Email address:

Leave this field empty if you're human: