As the guiding principle for what I wanted to express in my artist talk last weekend for the Talking Art speaker series I posed the question, “What are the stories you tell yourself?”.

There are stories we tell ourselves about what we can and cannot do, and these are the things that keep us from reaching our full potential. For the longest time I thought I wasn’t capable of creative work other than photography. When I gave myself permission to step outside of the little box I’d put myself into it’s led me to be good at many things I had wrongly assumed I could never do.

The key for me has been learning by doing. If I want to know how to do something or understand a material or process, then I go figure it out. This means doing hands-on research, reading books, looking at information on the internet, talking with other artists, or taking a workshop. But it’s all centred around exploring with my hands that thing I want to know. Explore, experiment, and learn. Making leads to more making because all of our skills are interconnected.

Paper cutting opened the doors to other process for me because it refined my fine motor skills. For years I’d told myself the story that I couldn’t draw, but paper cutting helped me relearn the ability. I’ve always wanted to learn needle work and embroidery, and told myself the story that it was beyond me. But here I am finally learning those things I’ve long wanted to know and creating beautiful work in the process.

We are all capable of so much more than we allow ourselves to believe. It’s up to us to change the story we tell ourselves. Maybe the time has come to tell yourself a new one.

I am moving more towards upcycing, repairing, and redoing my clothing, and the latest tool I can use to do this is dyeing. I recently purchased the sleeveless top pictured here from Value Village but felt the original pink colour didn’t suit me. I decided to try dyeing it red to make it more suitable, and also to see what could happen. The results are good, and I love this new shirt. The embroidered pattern details didn’t take the dye, but they look terrific against the red.

On the same evening I put a faded pair of capri jeans through a blue dye bath. I recently did a sashiko stitch repair to one of the legs, which is what led to wanting to improve the colour as well. I’ve had these pants for years, and held onto them hoping I could wear them again because they were once a favourite pair. They are back in rotation in my wardrobe after years of neglect.

A video posted by Paper artist (@rachael_ashe) on Aug 22, 2016 at 7:41pm PDT

I shot the video as I was working on the red dye bath. It needs constant agitation to make sure the entire piece of clothing dyes evenly. I found it mesmerizing to watch the garments swirl around the red water, and decided to share it.

Designed to Speak is an outlet of inspiration for designers and design enthusiasts profiling creative people of all disciplines with the objective to help inspire and engage the design community. I did this interview all the way back in April 2014 with Trevor Jansen and Mahyar Saeedi. I was asked to share my thoughts on making by hand and technology.

Designed To Speak – Rachael Ashe from Designed to Speak on Vimeo.

It was filmed on location at Hot Art Wet City during a group show I curated called, Voices From Another Room. In the background you can see work by Sarah Gee Miller, Joseph Wu, Connie Sabo, Alison Woodward, and me.

Watch more Designed to Speak interviews on the website.