We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Sonora Mindwerl a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Sonora thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Did you always know you wanted to pursue a creative or artistic career? When did you first know?

It was the summer of 2016 and my gap year was coming to an end- I had spent the past months working in a city, followed by realizing that both the work and city were draining my soul away by the day, which was followed by scraping together my savings and buying a one way ticket across the ocean.

I had wandered the moors and highlands, tripped on ancient cobbled streets, lost my breath at volcanic glaciers and midnight sun, and now I was back in Washington, walking down a mountain with my dear friend Andrew Kearns- a photographer who I had met on my travels. As we trundled down the trail, he asked me if I was excited about the college I would be going to in the fall- and in response I explained the good scholarship, good programs, and good opportunities that it would present.

He listened to me speak for a while and then he said a sentence which would change the path of my life forever.

“You know… you don’t HAVE to go.”

I was struck dumb. This was a thought that I had never considered for myself. I had been a passionate artist since before I could remember, and the creative realms were always the place that brought me the most joy and solace, but I had never considered that I could look at the wide open road of the normal career route and then just….step off.

Take a side road, a dirt two track away from the mainstream and towards an uncertain but inspiring future. That overgrown scrub path suddenly beckoned irresistibly in my minds eye, and I realized that forging my own way, making a living and a life that revolved around art and expression, was what I wanted to devote myself to.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

The core of my artistic offering to the world revolves around the hand painted jackets I have been creating for over 7 years now. These jackets are rescued from thrift shops, vintage stores, and second hand markets- chosen for their wear, character, shape, and story. Then I paint them. These paintings are poems and spells woven by the brush- stories of animals and plants, geometry and elements. Each jacket has its own personality, something that it calls forth or evokes, and it is this essence that I draw on to create the paintings which (I hope) will then resonate so deeply with a person that it becomes something that they want to wear all the time.

I have now had multiple people wear these totem jackets to their weddings, and the amounts of messages I receive about someone receiving their jacket and feeling affirmed, inspired, strong and confident in themselves by wearing it keeps me returning series after series.

My goal is for these jackets to move against the tide of fast fashion and cheap production- to give people the opportunity to invest in something that is infused with care and love and ART. To let people wear an art piece in their everyday lives instead of just hanging it up on a wall. To let the energy of the animate world reach people through a tangible talisman- a jacket which protects, warms, and reminds them of their own depth and power.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

I truly believe that everyone is a creative person, and that creativity is deeply intertwined with curiosity, which in turn is part of the tapestry that connects us to our place in the natural world around us. I think that without curiosity, we loose both our sense of innate creativity and our gateway into feeling like we truly belong in the living natural world.

I think that the most pivotal change to support creatives and a thriving ecosystem would have to begin with the education of children. If kids get time and space to play, to ask questions, to experiment and explore as their brains are developing, they will learn about their own creativity, and learn to care for the plants and animals and earth around them. If they are kept isolated from these things- in fluorescent lit schoolrooms with cement playgrounds, never getting to connect to the wild places in the world and writhing themselves, these functions of curiosity and creativity slowly wither. They wont care about a thriving ecosystem because they don’t recognize it, they don’t have a connection to it. If learning continues to become more focused on passing standardized tests and memorizing information, it will also continue to deaden and dull the spark of creativity within our future generations.

We are not alone on this planet- we are part of an intertwined tapestry of living things- animals, birds, insects, plants, trees, mycelia networks, even the earth and stone are buzzing with energy if you sink deep enough. I think that providing spaced for people to remember their own wildness will also remind them of their own creativity- as children yes, but also as adults. It is a home that each of us is always welcome to return to- we just have to remember that we have the key.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

The deep goal of my creative journey is to ally myself with the living beauty of the natural world. By weaving animals, plants, and symbols into my paintings and jackets I am seeking to spark that recognition within people- a recognition of being a part of something greater than themselves. Seeing part of themselves in the coyote and the moon, the sagebrush and the feathers of the condor. I aim to recognize in my world also that we as humans are a piece of this living ecosystem- we are not separate from it, and it is not separate from us. I have always been someone who feels everything extremely deeply which leaves me with a close relationship to the beauty and pain of the world.
I think it is very easy to get numb and jaded and dull in our society- there is so much stimulation all around us all the time, so much intensity in the news, shows, and towns or cities that most of us live in.
My creative journey is a quest to FEEL and to SEE, and by sharing the things that I experience, I hope to remind others of how close they truly are to that living heart of the world. It is right there, all around us. Dandelions through the sidewalk, the clouds overhead, the air. It is a gift to be human, to get the chance to experience the world through our senses. It can be so heavy and so painful, and so my mission is to remember and to remind that life is also so incredibly beautiful- and that it is the small moments and the little details which bring us back to this remembering.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://MindWerl.com
• Instagram: @mindwerl
• Youtube: Sonora MindWerl

Image Credits

Sonora MindWerl, Kadin Hecht