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A collage of people photos from a video meeting, with one large photo in the middle.

The art of mentoring – a rescue

Sometimes you need rescuing. Sometimes you see a shaft of light that beckons to a more hopeful path. One that sees what you’ve already done in a new light and reframes it, so you can lay down a better path ahead. A foundation, if you will. Someone who invites you to a new stage of players, who with their own experiences and challenges, magically and in a most fascinating way, become your weekly tonic. Someone who reminds you that us creative types often find ourselves stuck or overwhelmed or just needing a good push in the right direction.

This was my opportunity and great joy of 2023. A six-month mentoring program with Amy Kennedy, creator of unique and beautiful ceramic art and a learned expert in bringing people forward and together so they can be a more creative version of themselves.

My new version? She discovered the (imperfectly perfect) studio space right under her nose, re-discovered her love of unstructured, creative writing, and embraced the gift of a writing group and creative friends right across the country. She will not look back.

A person gesturing while looking towards the screen in a video meeting.
Studio table in front of an arched garden atrium.
Contact Maria
A collage of people photos from a video meeting, with one large photo in the middle.

The art of mentoring – a rescue

Sometimes you need rescuing. Sometimes you see a shaft of light that beckons to a more hopeful path. One that sees what you’ve already done in a new light and reframes it, so you can lay down a better path ahead. A foundation, if you will. Someone who invites you...
An array of hand-made custom ceramic tiles featuring silohuettes of leaves and flowers.

When one thing leads to another

Some years ago, I met a friend-to-be. She was painting a large canvas opposite the door to her solo exhibition. She had been a practising artist all her life. She is inspirational in more ways than one. I hoped (and knew) that we would become friends. What I didn’t foresee...
An artist standing next to her artwork in a gallery. The artwork is made of over one hundred ceramic leaves, swirls, gumnuts and fish (all of different colours) laid in a broad circle over black glass.

Reflections Exhibition

In the late ‘80s I took a silver jewellery making course with Marianne Eichenberg at what was then known as the Crafts Council of the NT. But an Ingrid Germanis’ Garden Sculpture course in 2012 showed me how to reclaim a creative life from the middle of motherhood and a full career in environmental science. I knew ceramics was...
Two women artists holding watercolour artworks with an A-frame sign advertising workshops in Darwin's Botanic Gardens.

Botanically Creative Workshops

What happens when people sit and create together under the shade of a gloriously massive rain tree? They arrive sometimes hassled, always with their mind still on the way here, almost ready to steady themselves and use their brushes and colours to bring a drawing to life...
Artist Maria Kraatz speaks into a microphone in a bushland setting at the opening of the Artist-in-the-Park program at the Territory Wildlife Park.

Artist-in-the-Park

Here I sit in a monsoon vine forest, not far from the smooth and dwindling flow of a groundwater-fed spring. We’ve not had much rain this last wet season and the earth struggles to provide water for the communities and environments dependent on its flow. It is a magnificently rich and tall forest gracing this small patch of the Territory Wildlife Park...

© 2024 Maria Kraatz CERAMIC ARTIST