Guardians and Guides of the Inner Wild

This collection is rooted in childhood summers at my grandmother’s country house—lush gardens, flowering trees, hidden paths, and the feeling that magical creatures were watching. It draws from the world of fairy tales, where animals are protectors, flowers hold meaning, and imagination blurs the line between reality and myth.

For over twenty years, I’ve worked with etchings from the 1400s-1800s, scanning images from old books, reworking and modifying them in Photoshop, and transferring them onto porcelain. The animals I returned to again and again held a certain stillness, a quiet formality, but they rarely carried the emotional depth I was looking for. Their postures and gazes were fixed, lacking the expression I wanted to convey. I yearned for something more meaningful, something that could hold symbolic weight and emotional presence.

Through thoughtful dialogue, reflection, and visual refinement, I began to evolve these historic images into something more intimate. What emerged were not just animals, but archetypal guardians and companions, each with their own expression of watchfulness, protection, and calm authority.

This collection began during a time of personal change. While grieving my dad’s passing, I found myself in a quiet, reflective space. I took long walks in nature. And in that stillness, the guardians began to appear, some of them quite literally crossing my path: the coyote, the owl, the fox, the mourning dove. Each one reflected back a part of me I was slowly and gently reconnecting with: grief, clarity, strength, steadiness, and curiosity.

The emerging illustrations are rendered in my usual sepia etching style, a visual language rooted in the antique books and engravings I’ve long worked with. Transferring these images onto porcelain connects them to the domestic; to the things we hold in our hands, use daily, and pass between one another. Like stories passed down from generation to generation.

These guardians offer a steady, protective, quiet presence during moments of uncertainty and transition, allowing space for our own truths to emerge.

Some of the Guardians appear in quiet relationship with a small, barefoot girl, a recurring figure throughout the collection. The girl stands beside each animal with serious awareness. Together, they represent a relationship built on mutual trust, where strength and vulnerability exist side by side.

Other pieces in the series focus on the animal guardians alone. These stand-alone works carry the same symbolic weight. Without the girl beside them, the animals speak more directly to the viewer, inviting personal connection and interpretation. Whether held in the hand or placed in the home, these objects become quiet anchors; reminders and companions.

The Girl and the Poppy

A recurring symbol throughout the collection is the poppy. It appears on the girl’s dress, and carries layered meaning that reflects the larger themes of the work.

The poppy speaks to remembrance, not of a specific event or loss, but of something older and more internal. A remembering of what has always been present: intuition, inner knowing, and the resilience and defiance that is often inherited or felt more than taught.

Poppies may look delicate, but they are wildflowers, capable of thriving in difficult conditions. The girl may be small and barefoot, but she stands next to wild beings without fear or hesitation. She appears vulnerable, but like porcelain, she carries an enduring strength.

About the Process

Each illustration in Guardians and Guides of the Inner Wild is created through an iterative process of drawing, exploration, and digital collaboration. Every image is the result of many rounds of storytelling, revision, emotional clarity, and symbolic refinement.

The visual style references antique etchings, and the emotional tone draws from personal narrative, memory, and immersion in nature.

The images are shaped by years of working with porcelain and by a lifelong interest in mythology, archetypes, and the quiet authority of the natural world.

Each piece is an invitation into that inner landscape: a place of quiet wonder, feminine strength, resilience, and wildness.