Artist STATEMENT

Sally Jane Webster, Founder of Wild Practice Arts

Sally is an artist, wild writer and creative facilitator with a passion for encouraging recovery and rejuvenation – both for nature and people.  She lived in rural East Anglia as a child, loved drawing and painting and recalls always having a deep feeling for the land, plants and creatures, as well as for fellow humans.

She pursued interests in health and well-being, gaining a degree in psychology and a post graduate counselling qualification. She has had a long and varied career in mental health services in the NHS and other organisations. She holds a degree in Fine Art and a Masters in Wild Writing: Literature and the Environment.

A formative experience was managing a horticultural therapy project – a 7 acre walled garden and vineyard in Oxfordshire - following which she was asked to manage a series of large estate gardens in the Cotswolds, Suffolk and the Chilterns.

However, her continued interest in the links between mental health and the outdoor environment brought her back to training in Youth mentoring with the Wilderness Foundation, Forest School Leadership and nature-based therapy. Subsequently she ran a private counselling practice - including nature-based therapy - until her retirement from counselling in 2023.

Sally is now focusing on her art practice, supporting community projects and teaching in the Carmarthenshire area. Increasingly she finds that this brings together elements from her diverse life experiences. She also really loves the fun she has whilst providing creative experiences for children, young people and adults.

She knows the benefits of outdoor activity in green spaces and how observing wildlife and plants brings people a sense of well-being. Also, being closer to the natural world, from which we came, can lead people to endeavour to look after their environment.

So, as much as she can, she runs classes outdoors, including her Art in the Garden group at Aberglasney Gardens. A new Forest School starts at Aberglasney soon (May 2025) in collaboration with Seed and Root Nature School CIC.

Sally’s use of materials reflects her concern for the environment, and shapes her approach to making artwork. She makes sculptural items with plant material salvaged from gardens or grown sustainably. She also enjoys repairing and reusing old textiles.  Having retrieved materials from river and sea shorelines – ghost net, plastic debris, driftwood – she creates unusual containers and woven objects. Her artwork and teaching involve playful exploration - weaving, sewing, scratching, marking, painting, tearing, tying, and untangling - resulting in re-marking, re-making, re-solving.

She likes to work with material that is old and used and sometimes broken - she feels that compassion for the brokenness of people and things can be the beginning of a new story – one that can move from sitting with loss or fracture, towards connection, creativity and rejuvenation.

Her work bears witness to our absolute entanglement and relationship with the web of life – the joy of it - as well as the sorrow and responsibilities. She endeavours to walk and work with this principle as her guide: encouraging others to tread lightly on the earth and share the wonder.

Sally welcomes opportunities to collaborate creatively on environmental and nature-inspired themes, including community projects, private commissions, and the provision of workshops, teaching and individual mentoring.

Do get in touch for a chat if you would like to explore the possibility of working together.

Mobile: 07765 337752

Email: sally@wildpracticearts.co.uk

Weaving Webs of Curiosity and Wonder