How a 1,000km pilgrimage inspired art exhibition
Manly multimedia artist Elizabeth Eastland has been greatly influenced by her travels, love of science and passion for pastels. Her latest artwork, A Thousand Prayers, soon to be on show at the Curl Curl Creative Space, is the culmination of a recent one thousand kilometre christian pilgrimage on the Camino de Santiago de Compostela in Spain.
From her early days in the Bahamas, Elizabeth was influenced by her artist mother and NASA-scientist father. This union ignited her passion for creativity and her pursuit of innovation. It also laid the groundwork for her later exploration of multiple art mediums.
“Three weeks after I was born, I moved to the Bahamas. So right away, I was travelling,” she laughs softly. By the time she moved out of home at age 17, Elizabeth had lived in 14 different cities.
“In the early part of my career, I pursued more the same line as my father. I was in telecommunications as a way of earning my crust. I had an international career,” she says of her work in computer design, which eventually led her to Australia.
In 2007, Elizabeth enrolled at the National Art School and later obtained her PhD in film from the Sydney College of the Arts.
On completing her PhD, she and her husband, Paul, embarked on a spiritual journey. In 2023 they did the Camino pilgrimage, creating an art project along the way.
The result is A Thousand Prayers, a collection of paintings, recordings and writing.
“We walked one thousand kilometres, crossing the 1,000th kilometre in the last hour of the last day of the pilgrimage. I wanted to practice my artwork on the way. And I had this idea that I would record a prayer every kilometre to honour that moment. And when I say a prayer, I mean it more in a secular sense, a gratitude or an observation or a mindful moment,” says Elizabeth.
“As I walked, I invited others to join me, so in the end, I had a thousand prayers from pilgrims around the world.
Some prayers were simple and others profound, all emerging from stories of loss, love, joy, pain, resilience, humour and friendship.”
Looking back on what she achieved, she says the experience allowed her to do her craft while finding a deeper meaning in life, embracing self-belief and acceptance and paying more attention by ‘slowing down’ in life.
“I realised I can shut myself down with self-criticism,” she says.
“I was very inspired by others who opened up and shared their lives and others who had a self-acceptance of who they were.
“I think we need to slow down as a society and really start paying attention to what we’re doing to each other, to the whole world, to the economy and obviously to the climate.”
In A Thousand Prayers, Elizabeth invites viewers to embark on their own journeys of introspection and to embrace the wonder of humanity through shared experiences that unite us.
The exhibition is open from 16 to 26 May at the Curl Curl Creative Space. Profits will be donated to the CanToo Foundation.
For more information, visit lizeastlandart.com