THE LAND CHAPTER 8 Beatrix (Bix) Fife THE LAND in English 2020.06.26 Today, the world is suddenly changing. While I write these words, a virus is spreading beyond borders. There are lockdowns in countries, environmental and social issues, huge challenges ahead for us humans on the earth, and suffering. How can I not be thinking of this, while writing about how I started exploring my inner self through drawing. Back then, 17 and a half years old, I moved from where I grew up, to the country I was supposed to belong to. It made me lose hold of what I had built up in my childhood, language, nature, climate, ways of thinking, relation to people. I found myself losing the landmarks I had built inside. Today many of us lose our jobs, our loved ones, our health, our stability: in this new world we might lose our landmarks too. We have new challenges and new perspectives.The sea is rough, but there is a horizon line somewhere. It is always there, like in a drawing, unless you don’t want to see it. I continue to draw, looking at other artists’ drawings, learning new ways, traveling, also traveling in the mind. Throwing many drawings away, letting them go, I keep the ones I need, for later. These drawings are landmarks. Small mirrors of the self in time and in space. acrylic on canvas board, 41cm x 31cm