Buying my art is good for the Planet…

Hannah Harvester 2023, Spring birches at the Mountain Street Reservoir, soft pastel on gessoed paper, 7.5 x 7.5” $275

…and this isn’t some greenwashing bulls*%t. There’s the concrete way in which this is true, and the more metaphysical. Here’s the concrete: my art sales support me, and I support the planet. My activism currently consists of hosting eco-grief support gatherings and being part of the native plants movement (which both supports biodiversity and helps slow climate change), and more is coming. In conversation with others my wheels are turning on how I can most effectively become more of an agent for change. Buying my art lets me do that. It’s how I pay for my life.

Here’s the metaphysical: my friend and collector Jenny Campbell believes that the love I pour into the world and that the world pours into me while I paint is good for the world. She believes the paintings themselves contain this love. I wish I agreed with her that just making my art “would be enough.” I do agree about the love. It’s there in action as I paint and it’s there in the work. The painting nourishes me, it nourishes the world in some hard-to-define way, and it can nourish you, too. You just have to buy it. It’s good for the planet–for real.

Here’s something concrete: Jenny commissioned me to do a painting of a special apple tree on her property as a gift for her husband. I made a few beautiful paintings, the most beautiful of which I foolishly forgot to photograph before they were framed, and the other of which is pictured here. The couple bought two. That weekend, I spent an entire morning pulling up invasive bittersweet with the our local forest and trails committee to make way for native plantings (which will both provide food and shelter for local fauna and improve the health and carbon sequestration of the soil). I spent hundreds of dollars and the rest of my time to buy and plant native plants in three different yards and cut back invasives from young native trees. Would I have done this if I had not sold those two paintings earlier that week? No. I would have done some of it, but I would not have felt free to buy nearly as many plants or spend the whole weekend simply tending the earth. 

Here’s something metaphysical: that same collector feels a sense of joy and connection with the planet every time she looks at my art. 

Hannah Harvester 2023, Oh Apple Tree soft pastel on sanded paper 9x9” $300

This painting and the one above are for sale. You can help the planet by buying them here.