Ragged Ass Road
This road actually exists and is located in Yellowknife. I took a picture of its sign in 2019 (see below) when I went to Yellowknife for a federal-territorial meeting. I paired the sign with another picture of a light post in Québec City and added some Ottawa pigeons. It became a truly Canadian composition!
And boy does it reflect life and the current climate of late, don’t you think?
This month marked the end of my working relationship with the federal public service. Some people would call it retirement, I just call it moving on to better things.
For the past year, I was on leave without pay and on a journey to rebuild myself after a brutal and toxic end to my active public service tenure. Despite no change to my daily life, the day of severance truly marked the end of a cycle, a loss of professional identity and a new found freedom. Nothing earth shattering but a sense of new beginning.
The year has been a year of deconstruction, even in terms of my artistic endeavours. I realised that I had approached my artistic career in a typical type A way, with objectives and goals to reach. This winter, I deliberately stepped away from painting to allow my inner desire to re-emerge from a better place. I am slowly regaining the desire to paint.
I also realised that my art needs to be tied to giving back in some shape or form - whether it is to raise issues, give a voice or fundraise for a given cause. As such, last month, I released a Collection of reproductions stemming from original silkscreen prints. Each print will be reproduced professionally only 20 times, in an 8 by 10-inch format and are $75 each; $40 of each sale will be donated to the Centre 507 and the Cipto in Gatineau.
The Collection is called Rising Up and reflects the Canadian sentiment following certain events and most of all, comments made South of the border.
You can find the collection here.
Book on Leadership
I have been working on and off on a book on leadership - mostly based on my 20years of experience being a leader within the federal public service. I have reached the half-way mark and I am planning to do a big push in the coming weeks - by writing this, I am committing!
I was wondering if there is anything you think would be important to cover in a leadership book. Let me know in the comment section of this blog or write me a note on LinkedIn or at mireille.laroche@rogers.com