Liz Able
Project Title: Heroic Journey Avatars
Liz is an emerging art therapist, yoga teacher and 3-D fibre artist with a passion for attachment theory and Internal Family Systems, and a keen interest in neuroscience. Her personal creative practice centres on basket weaving with natural materials, eco-dyeing and eco-printing, book-binding, and felting. She also enjoys exploring a variety of other 2- and 3-D media which she approaches with curiosity and enthusiasm.
Almost a decade ago, Liz experienced a sequence of personal events that piqued her interest in the intersection of art and mental health, prompting a move from beloved Gubbi Gubbi country to Turrbal/Jaggera land to pursue studies in art therapy. She is now completing a Master of Mental Health (Art Therapy) following a Bachelor degree in the same field.
Three years ago, Liz travelled to Rishikesh, India to study yoga, returning as a certified yoga teacher. Liz’s life-long practice of yoga has recently been enriched through studying Polyvagal Informed Yoga under Dr Arielle Schwartz. Throughout her life, Liz has experienced the physical and psychological benefits of both yoga and the arts as grounding, regulating, and restorative.
For her thesis, Liz has undertaken a heuristic study exploring whether yoga and art therapy are more effective in building vagal tone, and so improving resilience and resistance to stress and anxiety, when practiced together or separately. As an artist and a yogini with first-hand knowledge of these conditions – as well as the benefits of both modalities - this research seemed a logical next step. Woven through the roles of artist, yogini, student, and sole parent, it represents an integration of lived experience, academic study, and creative exploration.
The research journey has informed a profound, essentially positive - if not always comfortable - self-inquiry. The artworks exhibited map the inner terrain of this passage from the initial ‘Heroic Journey’ workshop through to completed research and thesis. Each piece reflects a character encountered along the way, with its own attributes and qualities. Through artistic concretisation of these parts, Liz has been able to recognise and accept their contributions and influences, and transform their presence into catalysts for growth, healing, and creativity. Using natural materials, grounds the work in connection to place. This process has been seminal in the realisation of personal and academic goals.
Canvas board, acrylic paint, wool tops, armature wire, paper, strawboard, waxed cotton thread, glue, polymer clay, acrylic paint, glass cabochon, purchased lock and latch
Approx 600 x 400mm (as displayed in total)
This motley crew were characters who stepped forward during the Heroic Journey workshop and who I dialogued with throughout the year. The handbound journal was used to create and house art therapy pieces during research.
Bangalow Palm Inflorescence
240 x 185mm
This basket, woven from a single type of fibre, reflects a utilitarian beginning — simple, contained, functional. ‘Then…’ speaks to an earlier phase where structure was necessary, laying the ground for the research that would later complicate, question, and ultimately broaden that approach.
Bangalow Palm Inflorescence, Norfolk Island pine, staghorn leaves, gum leaves, jacaranda stems, philodendron leaf sheaths, waxed cotton thread.
600 x 200mm
In contrast, ‘…and Now’ embraces multiple fibres, weaving difference into cohesion. This piece symbolises the emergence of authenticity — proud, diverse, layered. It mirrors how research informed new perspectives, revealing the richness of colour and complexity in both practice and self.
Prepared canvas, mixed media
297 x 420mm
‘Lost and Found’ captures an adolescent spirit — tender and still reaching outward with empathy and curiosity. Though sadness lingers, it is not definitive. The work reflects the paradox of research-led clarity: being changed by wounds yet still yearning for and seeking connection.
Mixed media on eco-printed watercolour paper
297 x 420mm
‘Emerging’, reveals a young warrior woman stepping into being. Ready but uncertain, tentative yet determined, she reflects the threshold moment of research and self-discovery. Clarity gathers strength here, teaching that courage often begins before certainty feels complete.
Mixed media on eco-printed canvas
530 x 250
The face of ‘Impulsion’ appears slowly, as though gathering itself into view. Her lowered head and furrowed brow reveal anger sharpened into clarity. This is not blind rage but concentrated insight: the dangerous, transformative moment when truth becomes impossible to ignore.
Mixed media on eco-printed canvas
810 x 410
‘Expulsion’ erupts with the primal duet of woman and wolf, both crying out with unrestrained force. This outpouring embodies catharsis — the scream of recognition, the howl of release. Here, clarity demands voice, refusing containment any longer. It illustrates the research-informed shift: once clarity arrives, silenced voices insist on expression.
Mixed media on eco-printed canvas
510 x 405
With ‘Illumination’, a woman is poised at the threshold of change. She has reflected, learnt, and now the first light breaks upon her. This is the dawning of clear-sightedness — contemplative yet ready to move forward with intention.