LOUISE LUTON
  • home
    • Testimonials
    • FAQs
    • Subscribe
    • Members page
    • Subscribers secret sale
  • Store
  • CUSTOM
  • Prints
  • Galleries
  • Portfolio
  • About me
  • Blog
  • Archive
Picture
Picture

This section will not be visible in live published website. Below are your current settings:


Current Number Of Columns are = 2

Expand Posts Area =

Gap/Space Between Posts = 48px

Blog Post Style = simple

Use of custom card colors instead of default colors = 1

Blog Post Card Background Color = current color

Blog Post Card Shadow Color = current color

Blog Post Card Border Color = current color

Publish the website and visit your blog page to see the results

Art can make you feel better

20/7/2014

0 Comments

 
Picture
That’s quite a claim to make. 
Last week I was hanging artwork in Salisbury Medical centre. It’s a collaborative exhibition with other artists from Plain Arts Salisbury, we have  Private View on Monday 28th July 6-8pm. 
Back to the point, Art makes you better. We are hanging our work in various corridors around the medical centre. There was a thoroughly lovely atmosphere while we went about our business unpacking paintings and trying not to get in the way. I was very pleased with my little corridor once I'd finished hanging.
I doubt very much if I’ll sell. I don’t mind one bit if I don’t, because that’s really not the point. The point is still that Art makes you feel better. 
I know this to be true.
Earlier in the year I was suffering from severe anxiety and panic attacks. It was most unlike me; usually I’m gregarious, one of life’s doers, one of those folks who can get on with it, generally happy and healthy. 
Suddenly (though it must have been creeping up on me for sometime) I’d lost my sense of humour, wasn’t sleeping properly, or eating properly and felt pretty grim. Gradually there appeared to be no pleasure left in my life. Everything seemed to be one endless to do list with no respite or joy. I got worse and worse. Eventually my ever loving husband asked me to visit my Doctor.
Salisbury medical centre happens to be my medical centre. There was something so very powerful, hanging up paintings in the very place that less than six months ago, I was sat, blinking back tears, with my stomach in knots and my heart beating out of my chest. I didn't know if I'd ever feel normal again.

How could I have recovered so quickly.
Three things really.
 1. A very good GP who reassured me, gave me a short term prescription to get me back on my feet,  made follow up appointments, listened carefully, believed me.  And she recommended Mindfulness.
2. I took her advice on the mindfulness. There are two books which really helped Ruby Wax’s "Sane new world" and Mark Williams’ "Mindfulness - finding peace in a frantic world". There’s lot being written about mindfulness at the moment, some people write it off as “bunkum”. They're wrong- it’s amazing.
Williams describes mindfulness as 
"an integrative, mind-body based training that enables people to change the way they think and feel about their experiences, especially stressful experiences. Mindfulness pays attention to thoughts, feelings and body sensations to become directly aware of them, and better able to manage them, it has deep roots in ancient meditation practices and also draws on recent scientific advances. Mindfulness is of potential value to everybody to help find peace in a frantic world”.
If that sounds lovely and easy you’re only half right! It is lovely but it’s difficult at first. If you’re so anxious that your brain is buzzing the whole time,  it's surprising difficult to try and slow it down, you have to practice and concentrate. But it really does work.
Evidence from Neuroscientific studies find:
  •  changes in those areas of the brain associated with decision-making, attention and empathy in people who regularly practice Mindfulness meditation;
  •  that meditation increases the area of the brain linked to regulating emotion, and that it improves people’s attention, job performance, productivity and satisfaction;
  •  that meditation increases blood flow, reduces blood pressure, and protects people at risk of developing hypertension: it also reduces the risk and severity of cardiovascular disease, and the risk of dying from it.
After really working hard on mindfulness for a few weeks, my anxiety levels decreased, I was able to reduce the prescribed medication significantly and most importantly I was back at work and painting again. It seems impossible to me now that I was in such a mess that I didn’t even set foot in my studio for three weeks. My goodness. Which brings me on to -
3. Art. Art makes you feel better. For some of us the practice of creating artwork might be the most mindful thing we do, we can get pleasure from it and sometimes it feels as if we are fulfilling a need. A need to create. I can forget all other things when I'm at work on a canvas, I have to be present, my mind doesn't dwell on the past or worry about the future. I'm in the moment.

For others, art gives them pleasure when they look. A picture can remind you of a place or a feeling. Many people feel calm or joy looking at a sea view. When there isn’t a sea view in the Doctor’s surgery,  why not have some paintings to look at instead!

There’s also something so lovely about local artists fulling up public spaces with artwork, and meanwhile the visitors are able to look at real art, made by real people who live up the road. They can discuss the work with other people, strike up a conversation. The people who work in the building too, can have something interesting to walk past each day. 

I can't really find the words to explain how blessed I am to be able to feel well again so quickly, and the joy of putting artwork into a public place, where people come to feel better.

I hope visitors to the practice enjoy the artwork. There are plenty of different styles on offer, different strokes for different folks; hopefully there's something for everyone.
 The work might spark a discussion, a query, a thought, a memory. All good.

Art, can raise a smile, provoke a debate, give you warm fuzzy glow…and can make you feel just a little bit better.

If you are in the Salisbury area, please feel free to come along to Private view on 28th July. Alternatively you can go to the see the exhibition during normal surgery hours 8am-8pm each weekday. Ask at reception on the way in.

Enjoy art; it makes you better.

Picture
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Louise Luton

    Artist 

    This section will not be visible in live published website. Below are your current settings:


    Current Number Of Columns are = 3

    Expand Posts Area =

    Gap/Space Between Posts = 35px

    Blog Post Style = card

    Use of custom card colors instead of default colors = 1

    Blog Post Card Background Color = current color

    Blog Post Card Shadow Color = current color

    Blog Post Card Border Color = current color

    Publish the website and visit your blog page to see the results

    Categories

    All
    12daysofchristmas
    2014
    2016
    2017
    2018
    2019
    2020
    2021
    2023
    2b Pencil
    Abstract
    Academia Bridge
    Acrylics
    Activities For Lockdown
    Affordable Art
    Affordable Art Fair
    Afrcia
    Africa
    Aladdins Cave
    A Month Of Colour
    Animal Art
    Animal Artists
    Animal Paintings
    Animals
    Anxiety
    Art
    Art Acitivities For Kids
    Art Blog
    Art Buyers
    Art Class
    Art Classes
    Art Demonstrations
    Art Development
    Art Fair
    Art Fairs
    Artisan
    Artist
    Artists
    Artists Block
    Artists-block
    Artists In Business
    Artist's Myth
    Arts
    Art Teacher
    Art Trail
    Art Tutorial
    Art Video
    Artwork
    Art Workshop
    Atkinson's Stunt Display
    Awards
    Baronsauction
    Barons Charter
    Bath
    Bath Pavilion
    Bbc-countryfile
    Beautiful
    Beautiful Paintings
    Bespoke
    Bird And Davies
    Blenheim Palace
    Blossom
    Bluebells
    Bluebell Woods
    Blue Violet
    Boxes
    British
    British Museum
    Brochure
    Brockenhurst
    Brokenhurst
    Buffalo
    Burnt Sienna
    Business
    Business Challenge
    Business Plan
    Buy Art
    Buy Art Online
    Buying Art
    Buying Original Oil Painting
    Canvas
    Cape Buffalo
    Cardboard
    Carey's Manor
    Carrie Green
    Cattle
    Ceramics
    Cezanne
    Change
    Cheetah
    Cheltenham
    Cheltenham Racecourse
    Cherry Blossom
    Christmas
    Christmaspresents
    Chrsitmas Presents
    Clouds Hotel
    Colour
    Colouring In
    Colours
    Comissions
    Commission
    Confidence
    Contemporary Art Fairs
    Content Form Process Mood
    Coronavirus
    Countryside
    Cows
    Create
    Create Your Own
    Creating
    Creative
    Creative Visionary Program
    Creativity
    Culture
    CVP
    CVP Is It Worth It
    Daily Paintings
    Dairy
    Dancers
    Daphne's Diary
    Deer
    Demonstrations
    Design
    Development
    Diary
    Discount Code
    Donkeys
    Dorset
    Drawing
    Durer
    Elephant
    Elephants
    Elizabeth Cairns
    Emerging Artist
    En Plein Air
    Enterprising
    Entrepreneur
    Erin Condren
    Exhibition
    Exhibtion
    Exhitbion
    Expansive Art
    Experimentation
    Farm
    FEA
    Female Entrepreneur
    Female Entrepreneurs Association
    Filofax
    Fisherton Mill
    Flamingo
    Food
    Fordingbridge
    France
    Free Downloads
    French
    French Impressionists
    French Inmpressionists
    French Ultramarine
    Fresh Art Fair
    Galleries
    Gallery
    Garden
    Gesso
    Gift
    Gifts
    Giraffe
    Giverny
    Goal Setting
    Gold
    Good Business
    Gorilla
    Grand-designs
    Growth-and-evolution
    Half Term
    Hampshire Country Show
    Hare
    Hare In Watercolour
    Haute-couleur
    Highland Cow
    Holiday
    Home Decor
    Horses
    How To
    How To Buy Art
    How To Draw
    How-to-get-organised
    How To Grow Your Business In 2021
    How-to-mount-a-print
    How To Paint A Hare In Watercolour
    How To Paint An Easter Bunny
    How To Paint A Portrait
    How To Paint In Oils
    How To Video
    Hugo The Elephant
    Imindmap
    Impressionists
    Inspiration
    Inspired
    Inspriation
    Into Africa
    Jackson's Art Supplies
    Janet-murray
    January
    Japan
    Jennifer Lee
    Jewellary
    John-craxton
    Just-a-card
    Karting
    Karts
    Kenya
    Kimono
    Kings Blue
    Landscapes
    Laura Knight
    Learn-to-draw
    Learn-to-draw
    Learn To Paint
    Lido De Jesolo
    Lifeiscrafted
    Light
    Limited Edition Prints
    Line-drawing
    Linen
    Linen Canvas
    Lion
    Lion Painting
    Lions
    Lisa-jacobs
    London
    Louise Luton
    Louvre
    Love-art
    Luminaries
    Luminaries Club
    Magnacarta
    Magnacarta800
    Magna-carter
    Makers Yearbook
    Mandala
    Marriage
    Masai Mara
    Media-diary
    Mediation
    Medium
    Members Club
    Micheal Harding
    Michelangelo
    Mindfulness
    Mindset
    Mindset Makeover Challege
    Mistakes
    Mixed Media
    Monet
    Mothers-day
    Museedorsay
    Musee-dorsay
    Nationalgallery
    National Gallery
    Natural History Museum
    Nature
    Newbury
    New Forest
    New Forest Pony
    New Forest Show
    New-year-resolutions
    Noble-art-supplies
    Observation Drawing
    Oil
    Oil Paint
    Oil Painter
    Oil Painting
    Oil Paintings
    Old Holland
    Old Sarum
    Orangutan
    Organise
    Original Art
    Paint
    Paint A Tiger
    Painting
    Painting Demo
    Painting Fun
    Painting-in-oil
    Paintings
    Painting Technique
    Paint-in-progress
    Paris
    Peacock Feathers
    Perfect Conditition
    Perfectly Planned
    Pheasant
    Pheasants
    Picasso
    Pigments
    Plain Arts Salisbury
    Planner
    Planning
    Poldark
    Pond
    Portrait
    Postage
    Postage And Packing
    Prime
    Print
    Printing
    Public-art
    Purple
    PV
    Raw Pigement
    Raw Umber
    Reading
    Reference
    Reference Photos
    Right Brain Business Plan
    Risk-taking
    Risk Taking In Art
    Rodin
    Room-with-a-view
    Safari
    Salisbury
    Salisbury Arts Centre
    Salisbury Art Trail
    Salisbury Cathedral
    Salisbury-cathedral
    Salisbury-christmas-market
    Salisbury Museum
    Salisbury Paint Off
    Salisbury-plain
    Salisbuty
    Sandown Park
    Sandown Park Racecourse
    Sculpture
    Sebastiano
    Self Doubt
    Sell Art
    September
    Shed
    She Means Business
    Shopping
    Sixmusic
    Sketch
    Sketchbook
    Sketches
    Sketching
    Sketching On Holiday
    Snow
    Sole Trader
    Solo Show
    Sorolla
    South Wilts
    South Wiltshire Business Of The Year Awards
    Spirefm
    Sprie Fm
    Spring
    Stag
    Stonehenge
    St Paul's Cathedral
    Strategy
    Studi
    Success In Small Business
    Sumatra
    Summer Shows
    Surrey
    #SWBOY18
    SWBOYA
    SWBOYA 2019
    Taking Risks
    Tate Britain
    Telegraph
    Texture
    Thai Dancer
    The Empowered Entrepreneur
    The Secret Lives Of Colour
    The White Hart Hotel
    Things To Draw
    Think Buzan
    Tiger
    Tiger Painting
    Timelapse
    Top Tips
    Travel Diary
    Treasure
    Turner
    Unfolding Your Life Vision
    Unique Gifts
    Valentines
    Value
    Venice
    Vibrant
    Video
    Violet
    Watercolour
    Waterlily
    Waterstones
    Webinar
    Wey Gallery
    White Park Cattle
    Wild Woodland
    Wiltshire
    Witlshire
    Women In Business
    Workinprgoress
    Work In Progress
    Workshop
    Workshops
    YBY2017
    Zebra
    Zest It

    This section will not be visible in live published website. Below are your current settings:


    Current Number Of Columns are = 3

    Expand Posts Area = 1

    Gap/Space Between Posts = 24px

    Blog Post Style = card

    Use of custom card colors instead of default colors =

    Blog Post Card Background Color = current color

    Blog Post Card Shadow Color = current color

    Blog Post Card Border Color = current color

    Publish the website and visit your blog page to see the results

    Pinterest

    Archives

    February 2023
    January 2023
    October 2021
    December 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    December 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    August 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    October 2015
    September 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    September 2013
    August 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013

    RSS Feed

Picture

SHOP  CUSTOM. PRINTS BLOG

Picture
I got the nickname "The wild painter" on safari in Kenya.
Picture
© 2022 Louise Luton. All work is protected by copyright. Reproduction is prohibited.
  • home
    • Testimonials
    • FAQs
    • Subscribe
    • Members page
    • Subscribers secret sale
  • Store
  • CUSTOM
  • Prints
  • Galleries
  • Portfolio
  • About me
  • Blog
  • Archive