Making art is risky, especially when we honor our cycles of creativity. In this episode we sit down with writer Sophie Strand as she shares her experiences with risk, navigating the pressure to create, listening to guidance from our web of non-humxn kin and how our relationships to land shape creative journey.
Mentioned in this episode:
About the Guest
Sophie Strand is a writer based in the Hudson Valley who focuses on the intersection of spirituality, storytelling, and ecology. But it would probably be more authentic to call her a neo-troubadour animist with a propensity to spin yarns that inevitably turn into love stories. Give her a salamander and a stone and she’ll write you a love story. Sophie was raised by house cats, puff balls, possums, raccoons, and an opinionated, crippled goose. In every neighborhood she’s ever lived in she has been known as “the walker”. She believes strongly that all thinking happens interstitially – between beings, ideas, differences, mythical gradients.
Her first book of essays The Flowering Wand: Lunar Kings, Lichenized Lovers, Transpecies Magicians, and Rhizomatic Harpists Heal the Masculine is forthcoming in 2022 from Inner Traditions. Her eco-feminist historical fiction reimagining of the gospels The Madonna Secret will also be published by Inner Traditions. Her books of poetry include Love Song to a Blue God (Oread Press) and Those Other Flowers to Come (Dancing Girl Press) and The Approach (The Swan). Her poems and essays have been published by Art PAPERS, The Dark Mountain Project, Poetry.org, Unearthed, Braided Way, Creatrix, Your Impossible Voice, The Doris, Persephone’s Daughters, and Entropy. She has recently finished a work of historical fiction, The Madonna Secret, that offers an eco-feminist revision of the gospels. She is currently researching her next epic, a mythopoetic exploration of ecology and queerness in the medieval legend of Tristan and Isolde.
Follow her on Facebook or on Instagram @cosmogyny.
About the Host
Zaneta (they/them) is a queer, multi Brooklyn-based sound ritualist, listening educator, nature recordist, creativity activist, tarot reader, and podcast host. At the core of their work is a deep desire to remember how to live in interconnectedness. Whether that is through meditation and connecting with the self, or in community rituals to connect to the land, Zaneta weaves sound and ritual to create experiences that transform the way participants hear and connect to the world.
In the spirit of an interconnected world, Zaneta focuses on supporting folx to make their art and express themselves fully, knowing that interconnection and interdependence are rooted in our individual wholeness and that our authentic creative expression is at the heart of that wholeness. It’s towards this collective vision that Zaneta offers channeled tarot readings for creative liberation, and offers readings to support artists in navigating their careers and projects.
To learn more about Zaneta’s work, visit www.soundartmagic.com
Or follow them on IG @soundartmagic
About the Podcast
Art Witch is where creativity, magic, and healing align for personal and collective liberation. Hosted by Brooklyn-based sound ritualist, arts educator, and tarot reader Zaneta, Art Witch aims to provide resources for the creative journey. In this podcast you’ll hear from a variety of artists, witches, healers, and experts sharing their wisdom and stories, all with the intention of helping folx make art and share their unique magic with the world.
Art Witch has a Patreon community where members meet regularly for group meditations, full moon rituals, and community conversations on art and magic. In addition, we have a full library of meditations and videos for the creative mystical journey.
To support this podcast and become a member, visit www.patreon.com/soundartmagic
@artwitchpodcast
