Creative Life Journal
Reflections on creative life, photography, natural history, and fine art — shaped by a lifelong connection with nature.
Joined at the Hip
Images and words have always travelled together for me. While a photograph can speak powerfully on its own, words can guide, teach, and open new ways of seeing.
Here, in the quiet heat of the day, a young Lumholtz tree kangaroo gently settled the debate — climbing onto my shoulder and reminding me that presence sometimes matters more than progress.
Readers often begin here
Many of the ideas explored here form the philosophical backbone of my teaching and workshops.
Digital Art: Outback & Country
Outback & CountryThe term ‘Outback’ is usually considered colloquially as the name applied to the vast, unpopulated and mainly arid areas that comprise Australia’s interior and remote coasts. ‘Country’, another colloquially used word, is also applied variably. As...
Digital Art: Australian Wildlife
Wildlife Connections‘…no-matter what sort of animal, bird or snake…all that animal same like us.Our friend that.’Bill Neidjie, Gaagudju Elder, Kakadu. The term ‘wildlife’ includes the thousands of insects (over 500,000 species), spiders (850 species), invertebrate...
Digital Art: Australia’s Mountains and Ranges
Mountains and Ranges'What catastrophes have you seen,what upheavals in the landscape,what misadventures, what cataclysms,what major calamities? All jagged rock,bend back and twisted,marked by long-gone wind and water. Did anyone bear witness?.'Steve ParishA...
Natural History: Celebrating the Koala
Australian Natural History:Celebrating the KoalaPhotography Steve Parish - Text Karin CoxIn 1803, the Sydney Gazette commented on the first live specimen of a Koala captured by Europeans, stating that “the graveness of the visage ... would seem to indicate a more than...
Natural History: Possums and Gliders
Australian Natural History:Possums & GlidersFor some Australians, possums are not at the top of the popularity list when it comes to Australian wildlife. This is primarily due to the brush-tailed possum, the boldest, most wide-spread possum in Australia. This...
Creative Life: Dare to Fly
Dare to Fly‘Unique creative expressions evolve when we step outside our comfort zone.’ Steve ParishIn order to feel deeply, to explore new creative expressions, sometimes we must unshackle ourselves from self-imposed restraints. Stepping outside our comfort zones and...
Creative Life: The Struggle
Creative Life:The Struggle“The nice thing about ageing is thatyou can look back on your life and see life’sbiggest struggles were the bits that made you. Steve Parish Part of the challenge of creating something just for you is permitting yourself to do it. Depending...
Creative Life: Anxiety a Story of The Mind
Creative Life:Anxiety, A Story of the Mind “Anxiety is often a sustained emotion producedby a story that the mind has concocted.It is often the result of a fear ofsomething that has not happened,an attachment to someimagined negative outcome.”Steve Parish For many...
Natural History: Australian Parrots
Natural History:Australia's ParrotsPhotography Steve Parish - Text Karin CoxMore than 330 parrot species inhabit our planet, and Australia is home to about 56 of them. In fact, this continent’s abundance of these birds led mapmakers of the 1500s to annotate the coast...
Natural History: Dry Sclerophyll Forests
Natural History:Dry Sclerophyll ForestsText Alan Fox - Photography Steve Parish'2 December, 1642 … an abundance of excellent timber, and a gently sloping watercourse in a barren valley … they had seen two trees about 2 or 2.5 fathoms [c. 4 metres] in thickness,...
Creative Life: Awakening the Inner Child
Awakening Your Inner Child‘All children are born artistsand then they grow out of it.’Pablo PicassoOur creativity is birthed the moment we’re conceived in our mother’s womb. As we start playing, everything we touch, we see, we hear, and we smell is driven by an...
Creative Life: The Production
Creative Life:The Production'Every process involved in producing an artistic work should be an expression of your soul.'Steve ParishThe culmination of the inspiration, the quest and the struggle leads to the most enthralling phase of all – the production. Problems of...
Creative Life: The Quest
Creative Life:The Quest“Choice, challenge and change, ingredients of the creative processthat are best found when journeying well away from the familiar”.Steve Parish Goals may change as the search for a path progresses – indeed, goal posts may be moved by...
Photographing Australia: The Red Centre
Photographing Australia: The Red Centre For a travelling photographer, particularly one who has chosen to bring or hire his or her own vehicle, the biggest problem that you will confront in the Red Centre is time management. If you have plenty of time, you will be in...
Digital Art: Australia’s Arid Lands
Red Land Blue Sky‘When I am…completely myself, entirely alone…it is on such occasions that my ideas flow best and most abundantly.’Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, composerAustralia is the driest inhabited continent, with 70% of its land being either arid or semi-arid. Arid...
Digital Art: Australian Rivers Lakes and Floodplains
Rivers, Lakes and Floodplains'There's mystery within those wildyet not forgotten places. Life ever-watchful, curious, yet aware,tense to every sound and movementbehind, overhead, underfoot,seeing yet unseen. Busy, lively, fussy, agile,all lightly leaving marksand when...
Digital Art: Australian Coasts
Australian Coasts‘Consider every process involved inproducing and navigating your artisticvision as an expression of the essence of who you are.’Steve ParishAustralia is one of the most urbanised nations in the world, with an oft-quoted figure of 85% of the population...
Digital Art: Australia’s Dingo
Australia's Dingo‘…no-matter what sort of animal, bird or snake…all that animal same like us.Our friend that.’Bill Neidjie, Gaagudju Elder, Kakadu.Widely regarded as Australia’s native wild dog, the Dingo (which shares the family Canidae with domestic dogs and the...
