I spend the day exploring a public, natural environment, such as the woods, the local riverbanks, fields, or beaches. I search for, gather, and collect evidence of humans interfacing with sacred natural spaces, and also search for what gets let behind by nature itself as it moves through its own natural life cycles. Once I've gathered enough of whatever reveals itself on a given day, whether by human neglect or natural deposit, I create an intuitive, meditative response, speaking to the conversation between human and earth in that specific time and place. I remove and dispose of the litter and man-made materials after documenting and leave the organic materials in formation as an ephemeral offering and experience. 

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Mandala making for me is less of an art than it is an exploration and conversation with place. It’s a chance to search, to explore, to observe closely, to gather, to clean up a bit, and to honor. Through the making, it’s a chance to slow down, sit low, connect through body and breath, to listen, and to have a quiet visual conversation with all that surrounds me. Sometimes that conversation takes the form of an apology, sometimes an offering, sometimes a new story, sometimes an honoring of spent lives and turned cycles, sometimes it’s just playing. This particular conversation led to me spending the next two months in this beautifully nurturing area of the woods beside the river, making work for the @giftsfortheriver project. 
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