OUR VISION
Art is Spirituality and Spirituality is Art linked by the Beauty of your Heart. Art is your work-out to express your hidden emotions and Spirituality is your work-in, your self-development and inner healing. Art is not Creativity if you just paint an object without your heart, like repeating a mantra is not Spiritual if it’s mechanical and there is no intention behind. By adding colour to a ray of light that you are painting, you are simply giving a shape of Beauty to the Deep meaning and by using your heart, when you are expressing yourself, you start your inner healing.
Art and Spirituality are linked by a golden thread represented in the golden circle, the enso of our logo as a symbol of life. This thread, from the earliest times, has been the symbol of knowledge that stems from personal experience, free from conditioning. It is a thread because it represents the continuity of an experience that is always ancient and always new and it is golden because it is immortal, it always remains even in the most chaotic and obscure times, sometimes more apparent, sometimes more hidden.
Now, the intention of our centre is to create an Alchemy to awaken people to a new, deeper, more connected, higher, more universal awareness and personal growth. The ‘Art of turning lead into gold according to the ancient philosophical tradition is what inspires us deeply, because we believe the time has come to take the simple artistic workshop to the next level of depth. You must ignite the inner fire of passion for Beauty, making favourable conditions for the ignition of the Athanor, the Alchemical Furnace, which dwells in your breast, with the will to paint as true soul painters, following the harmony of cosmic cycles and Mother Nature.
Our mission is to help you realise who you are, what you want and what inner tools you have and support your willpower. And these represent that mustard seed which is so small but which, once sprouted, will give life to a great plant. The mustard seed symbolises the beginning, the incipit of the Great Work, the beginning of self-work. We want to help you become an Inner Explorer, as the most difficult journey is the one that leads you inside yourself to discover who you really are. But it is only in contact with your soul that you are finally awake and the spark you ignite in you is part of the whole, and in that flame resides the whole universe.
We believe that through a creative attitude you can become co-creator of your life, fertilising new ideas and reconnecting yourself with your soul mission, as everything is united by a single thread that weaves the extraordinary, admirable web. Everything is set in motion by this supreme energy, this miraculous force that is none other than life. And from this point of view, physical or psychic illnesses are nothing more than the visible consequence of a rupture in this marvellous thread that binds every object of creation and transmits its vital charge to everything. And through our therapists we wish to rekindle that light in your body and thus in your soul.
And we also want to accompany you through the aesthetic experience, because the true artist paints to give glory to the object he has seen to represent the manifestation of Beauty and the Poetic vision, where the visible world is the reflection of the invisible one. Beauty is the equivalent to the Revelation that applies to a spiritual awakening. The beauty of colours has the same potential of the revelation of your inner awakening.
The choice of Red as our primary identifying colour is a strong one. It is the first colour used by man after black and has always been linked to fire and, therefore, to everything connected to its symbolism: the spirit, the vital spark. Red represents life, and consequently also the strength it manifests and the energy we need. Red awakens the senses, stimulates creativity and is the colour of the first chakra, the root, linked to the earth. Through the root energy we experience rootedness to the earth and are able to connect with those forces that guide us in our existence. We are able, in short, to find our living space and feel in tune and in harmony with life, through our hand suspended in painting the canvas of life, blue as the colour of peace and divine potential, and with our fingers depicting the Om mudra, bearer of inner serenity.
And life is a dance of coloured veils, a circular path of wisdom and knowledge, a canvas where the divine within you paints. You are simply an instrument tuned to perfection with the harmony of the Creator. The painter is you, the canvas is you, the colours are still you, the painting is still you, the one who admires the work is you.
Enjoy the journey!
OUR DIRECTORS
Art and Spirituality is the passionate creation of Giada. In 2022 also two Directors, Monika and Gloria have joined the board of our Social Enterprise CIC.
GIADA from Invisible Caims
Originally from Milan, Giada started very early to be a serious world traveller. Her decision to spend all her savings exploring new places led her to wander by campervan around Australia for months.
As a result of twenty years of travelling through her personal and professional experience as International Events Manager , she began to write, and co-authored a non-profit book with 33 other Italian women (“Donne che emigrano all’estero”- “Women moving abroad”).
She has been studying and practising Buddhist teachings and meditation with the traditions NgalSo Ganden Nyengyu, Fpmt Mayayana, Theravada Vipassana in Nepal, India and Italy. She has been in the Five Tibetan Rites with Silvia Salvarani, one of the most accredited Italian teachers of Hatha Yoga and Raja Yoga. Approached the imaginal world and dreams with the psychologist Elio Occhipinti and went through a regressive hypnosis journey with the vision of the psychiatrist Brian Weiss.
She has also become a qualified Shamanic Practitioner and Teacher, Integral Yoga Teacher, Forest Therapy Guide (Shinrin Yoku) and Ikigai Coach and she is part of the Italian-Swiss Association for Counselling and Coaching, Aiscon.
She has also become a professional numerologist studying for a Diploma in Esoteric Numerology with The Connaissance School of Numerology.
Her creativity has always been manifesting in different ways: from writing, to developing a personal self-expression through the use of colors in a more traditional Art Therapy.
In 2015 she started a project named ‘Drink In Art’, organizing private exhibitions in local flats to promote Edinburgh-based artists, which now continues in the venue Art and Spirituality Centre .
MONIKA, Artist from PinkHat
Since she can remember she has loved drawing, painting and colours. One of her earliest memories is the lovely smell of crayons during artistic hours at kindergarden. Her life is just connected with creation and art. And the same with books. She was 5 years old when she started to read, 8 when she wrote her first poems and begun writing a book for children. Always she says that books are her best teachers. She takes knowledge from them to develop her inner reality. Also, people… Amazing stories of their souls! She loves to observe them as of herself. Their lives are like new novels for her, but instead of eyes, she “reads” them with ears. Her constant Love: Nature. She admires trees, wind, breathtaking views… She is looking to explore it more and more, happy with any opportunity to visit new places of Earth. In Scotland, Livingston, where she lives, she opened an Artistic Studio she called Pinkhat.
Why Pink Hat?
I am sure you know the book “Little Prince”. It starts with an illustration showing an intriguing shape, similar to a hat. But also it could be… a snake who swallowed an elephant. A hat for her is a symbol of imagination and creativity of an open mind. Like a magician finds in his hat many surprising things, she can find also for you many creative ideas. Except for a hat, In her logo’s shape, you can find her initials and also symbolic sign of infinity, which is so close to her philosophy and art.
GLORIA, Food Artist from MadeByflour
On her journey with Madebyflour, Gloria contributed during Covid to raise funds to help a charity for the production of meals for people in need and thanks to online classes, when the world was in lockdown, authentic healthy cooking lessons managed to bring people together and bring some serenity and joy in these hard times.