From the Compost Heap header. A pencil style illustration of a compost heap with flowers and plants growing around it. A bee buzzes by and a white rabbit hops by.

Meander

Four collagraph prints on a wooden desk with library drawers. Prints are meander maps in the shape of river courses in light purple, yellow, blue, and green.

Over the last decade I have been neuroqueering my creative practice. Setting aside neurotypical, able bodied, and capitalist expectations for consistency, branding, and profit like the ill fitting shoes they are.*

Looking back, the times in my life I was rigidly consistent I was run deeply outside my own capacity, which over time took a toll on my health (both mental and physical.)

Allowing my creative projects to fluctuate with my capacity, as a chronically ill autistic caregiver means that they ebb & flow. Seasons when my time and energetic capacity expand so does my creative practice. When I am experiencing a pain flare or focusing on caregiving challenges my projects shift into dormancy or ideation.

Having many different mediums means there is always something to fit my capacity.

I NEED ART TO LIVE.

Art is how I self regulate, how I co-regulate with my child, and how I process lived experience and the world around me.

Without art I go to a dark place.

For years, I had inflexible routines and self imposed deadlines that did not serve me. But the newly discovered fluidity of my creative ecosystem has allowed me to flourish in unexpected ways.

This meander map is based on my 2025 Artist’s Log which tracked the time spent on each creative project over the course of the year.

These undulating ribbons represent the four main streams of creativity I pursued in 2025.

Zine shows a meander map of two overlapping lines in the form of a river both yellow and green. The lines ebb and flow across the folded page. Typed text reads Temporal analyisis meander map creative ecosystem Sarah Shotts 2025. The diagram is dated Jan to Dec from top to bottom. The horizontal scale is dormant, ideation, progress, and danger zone. Both meanders dance toward danger zone in autumn.

Yellow: visual art

Green: self publishing and writing

Zine shows a meander map of two overlapping lines in the form of a river both purple and blue. The narrow lines ebb and flow. Typed text reads Temporal analyisis meander map creative ecosystem Sarah Shotts 2025. The diagram is dated Jan to Dec from top to bottom. The horizontal scale is dormant, ideation, progress, and danger zone. Blue dances close to danger zone in spring, but otherwise meanders are narrow and only reach the middle of the page.

Blue: redesigning website & blogging

Purple: zines

The process of crafting these prints took several months. Calculating stats, making a graph, drafting the meanders, testing printmaking techniques, paper & inks, creating collagraph plates with unraveling cotton twine, and printing each plate onto wet paper using the Provisional Press.

The prints were digitally combined for the zine cover and overlaid with a key on transparent vellum. This layer can be removed to display the zine as a diptych. The zine was hand typed on my 1950s Smith-Corona typewriter.

The concept and color palette were inspired by the meander maps of geologist and cartographer Harold Fisk.

The above text is from February’s zine. If you’d like a copy you can subscribe for $5 a month or buy a single zine in my shop.

Here’s a peek at how the layers work together with the transparency.

I’m also sending original prints to everyone on the $10 art collector tier.

Here’s a peek at how the prints are coming out (ignore the buckled untrimmed paper). They will all be flattened, signed, and numbered. Each print is unique. Remaining prints will be added to my shop, and will be priced at $65.

Collagraph print of a sage green river meander
Collagraph print of a narrow blue river meander
Collagraph print of a golden yellow river meander
Collagraph print of a light purple river meander

Collagraph is a printmaking process I learned in university. It feels good to return to it after so much time. I shared more about the process (along with a few other test prints) on the blog a few weeks ago.

Test prints and collograph plates of a meandering river with blue ink

Thank You

To everyone who sent kind messages and preordered books after last week’s post about illustrating neurodivergence. Gracie & I really appreciate you and very excited to get this picture book into your hands.

If you’d like to preorder a limited edition hardcover you can do so here.

(Paperbacks will be coming soon at a lower price point.)

In Case You Missed It

If you’re having a hard time with the state of the world I wrote this for you a couple weeks ago.

There’s some good in the world Mr. Frodo. ⛰️

Thanks for being here and supporting my art.

I appreciate you.

Sarah signed with a swoopy S
footnotes

* Neuroqueering is used here as the verb meaning, “the practice of queering (subverting, defying, disrupting, liberating oneself from) neuronormativity and heteronormativity simultaneously” as coined by Nick Walker Ph. D.

Cross Pollinate 🐝