Nectar: A Family Art Residency
Photos taken by the wonderful Karelle.
This July, our family had the honor and privilege to join three families in Nulles, Spain for a weeklong artist residency stewarded by Nectar. The residency program offers a community-based living and working experience for global artists and creatives in all career stages.
While we do not have a consistent studio practice, we are multi-faceted creatives. Daily, we operate a two-person studio helping clients visualize creative solutions. If you’d like to see our full-breadth of work, you can find it here. Outside of client work we spend our days gardening, drawing, painting, ideating, building a third space for reading and discovery, exploring and expanding our creative skillsets.
When we started researching residencies, we specifically looked for places offering time and space to reflect on our individual creative practices while catering to our needs as caregivers. We were in search of a place that didn’t treat family as an afterthought but intentionally incorporated children in the experience. We are incredibly thankful the Internet led us to Nectar. Honestly, we were already sold on the idea of a rural Spanish setting surrounded by nature. Even better, it provided morning workshops for the kids to create, explore and imagine.
In true collective fashion, families cooked and ate together every day. The conversations flowed from the kitchen to the dinner table, on walks into town and while floating in the pool. Being with a group of creative parents affirmed we are not alone in figuring out the delicate and often difficult balance of being an artist and caring for our children.
It was especially beautiful witnessing the power of play breaking through any communication barriers. Play speaks all languages. By the end of the week the children were roaming freely together, laughing and playing on the grounds.
As for our artistic practices, we were able to focus on developing ideas we’d been sitting on for years. We’ve carried these ideas back with us to begin properly executing them in between work and parental demands. Please stay tuned as we share our progress and process.
Thank you to Nectar founders Olga and Tai for being incredible hosts. They’ve spent 10 years stewarding rural residencies, keep up with them and if you get a chance we highly recommend applying. Our experience has left us inspired and thinking about how we can provide similar experiences right here in the South.
