Description

This piece was painted between the two harvest festivals of Lughnasadh and Autumn Equinox 2025. For a while I have been struggling to find the muse for this image and to express the concept of reaping what you sew, that not all harvests are life sustaining, which is why I chose Macha as the goddess for the Lughnasadh image. As queen of her tribe and goddess of battle she was known to behead her enemies and collect them just like fallen acorns, thus her trophies, her war harvests were known as “Macha’s Acorns”.

At first the image was going to be a pure celebration of harvest bounty, but as we enter tumultuous times and an uncertain future, harvest time has become bitter sweet for me. In our era I feel we are reaping a harvest of death as much life sustaining grains. I have come to the conclusion that it is not the harvest which is good or bad, life sustaining or death creating, it is what we do with the harvest which has been provided which will determine the survival as our species. So this piece is a reminder that no matter the harvest we must make the most of it.

“Macha’s Harvest” will be my Lughnasadh painting for the Wytches Wheel Series and the lovely Angela Rushton from one of our own homegrown bands here in the West Country ‘Beckon the Wyrd’ agreed to be my muse. As a pagan singer her energy of the queen warrior was perfect for this piece which was in part inspired by her magick voice and the song “The Morrigan Rides” … Beckon the Wyrd can be found on Spotify