Welcome to my creative experiment, curating this lovely little Art Blog.

Capturing the hidden slivers of beauty in the world through photography is the primary creative expression to which I’ve been drawn since high school, though I have a zillion other artistic interests and curiosities. Those have included – or presently include – painting, poetry, jewelry making, sewing and textiles, historic arts preservation, medieval rosaries, historical fashion, living history museums, dancing classical ballet, the world of small creative businesses and worker-owned cooperatives… not to mention dabbling in swing dancing, flamenco guitar, craft bartending, family genealogy, etc. etc. etc.

Oh, and writing. I guess I’ll be doing plenty of that here. About the creative life, and the spiritual life, about pilgrimage and calling and the power of stories. And community.

Artists across all spectrums have so much in common, in my view, and such potential to thrive in their work as artists, yet often they are isolated or discouraged and have a deep hunger for community. {My working definition of an ARTIST is deliberately quite broad: visual, tactile, musical, theater, dance, writing, culinary, and so on…}

I thrive on connecting artists together and encouraging them to persevere in their creative work, having hosted an informal Artist Prayer Group at my home over the years, and spearheading an art show for the restaurant industry called SideWork (at the fabulous FareStart organization where I worked at the time). Any chance I have to support artist friends and highlight small scale artisans, crafters and creatives is a joy to me.

Creative adventures are central to my inspiration as an artist, from local photo expeditions to the Camino pilgrimage I made in France in 2019. My latest one was a three-month artist residency in Massachusetts, in the spring of 2022. After a recent move to the Skagit Valley, a lush landscape to the north of Seattle, I landed upon a wonderful art studio which I share with a good friend, where building an old-school photography darkroom is in the works. My day job as a legal assistant sustains me in the meantime, which is equal parts interesting and challenging and miraculous (with an ADD brain full of squirrels, if you know what I mean).

As I’ve pressed deeper into the stories which have resonated with me and those that have shaped my life, I have come to find that life and art can be intertwined in strange and beautiful ways. These journeys of the heart – forming a pilgrimage in the truest sense – mark this next stage of my work as an artist and the stories I want to tell.

Join me on the way.

~ Janelle Bighinatti

Artist, Writer, Fine Art Photographer