I follow Performing Magic in the North on Instagram, and I happened to catch that for the month of July, they created a weekly community challenge to create written works, artworks, videos, or any other art forms, revolving around specific themes within Magic in the North. They called it Wyrd Friday, and thankfully, they already had the theme for each week, making planning out pieces a breeze.

I had that first Friday off from work, so I decided to spend some time creating a digital art piece on the first theme – Wyrd and Fate – to submit. I have been reading a lot about Scottish folk traditions and magic and so had a good idea of how I wanted the piece to look. Red thread is a common tool in Scottish folk magic, and it felt like a really wonderful visual as a woman is led by her “second sight” along to the tree of fate, full of many opportunities and paths. I had a lot of fun and ended up submitting my piece late in the evening.

I decided to try and continue with the challenge, pushing myself to submit a piece each Friday. I liked that it wasn’t a daily challenge, and since they had provided all of the prompts, I knew what the theme was each week – Second Sight, Hidden Folk, and Dream Magic . I could begin a plan of what I wanted the next piece to look like, and I continued to create digital works that carried a color scheme, character, and thel red thread, through all of the pieces. I even created a little animation! I really enjoyed the whole process, and learning more about Scottish folk magic.

You can see all of the completed works in my portfolio here on the site, or on my Instagram.