I pursue art as an act of union with the ultimate creative source. A thread through my work is a striving to make visible the magical spark of life in what we may experience as mundane, make explicit the divine within the ‘ordinary’.
My work aims to transcend culturally confined definitions of ‘self’, exploring life and the experience of living, in a synthesis of cultural languages and meanings.
I find inspiration in archetypal tribal and folk art traditions from across the globe, from myth and story, and traditional materials of women’s domestic creativity.
I select media and techniques that feel appropriate, affecting them through my creative activity, seeking integrity of intention and material, to create new expression and physical form.

Education and Community Work
Over the last 10 years I have been the lead artists on a range of school based projects, creating site specific mosaics and murals for school sites and public spaces.
My approach focuses on ensuring that everone involved in a project, regardless of ability, genuinely contributes to the design and the creation of the final outcome.
I have delivered, and coordinated programmes of gallery based workshops. led primary teachers hands-on INSET sessions on ways of using artists work to support art work with children. I have worked with ‘excluded’ teenagers, and for the last few years I have also been teaching adult drawing courses and evening classes.

View my website http://www.monica-shanta.net/