Women in Wellness: In Bluem with artist Alisha Kitto

Rooted in a blend of urban hustle and natural tranquility, artist Alisha Kitto, a vibrant soul hailing from Brisbane, Australia, embodies the very essence of modern wellness and artistic expression. We chatted with Alisha about her odyssey to Self Love and holistic health, a journey of resilience and transformation and the insights she gained along the way:

"I live a beautifully busy life close to the city, working full time and creating art while also prioritising slow living, gentleness and a deep connection to nature and my body. I’m honoured to share my Self Love story, my painting practice and my skin health journey with you all and to give back to Bluem and this community that has brought so much enrichment to my life.

My story of self love starts with a bit of darkness… I grew up in a very unstable environment. While I had lots of love around me my childhood was also riddled with addiction, abuse and neglect. Because of this I grew up extremely disconnected from myself and my body. Early on I developed debilitating anxiety and depression and fell into my own addictive patterns. At 18 I experienced a true rock bottom resulting in a hospital admission and a diagnosis of complex ptsd, from here I made the decision to prioritise my mental health and trauma healing. The journey hasn’t been easy and most of the way I’ve taken two steps forward and one step back but slowly I have built a beautiful and peaceful life for myself and I now have such a deep and loving connection to my body and my intuition.

This leads me to my art practice… I’m an abstract artist who creates monochromatic paintings. I overlay repetitive mark making on top of dense fields of colour. Through my paintings I speak to the lasting imprint of trauma. From a distance my paintings seem like pure colour but when you’re up close and personal with the work the overwhelming presence of the marks becomes obvious.

We all carry these invisible scars with us, from afar the marking isn’t visible, but when you become close to a person we’re able to bear witness to each others pain.  The invisible becomes visible. 

Another important aspect of my art practice is the transformation and transmuting of pain that takes place in the making. My process is time consuming and labour intensive just like the process of healing from trauma. Yet the outcome of both is a felt sense of peace. I love this correlation between my artwork and trauma healing.

My latest body of work titled ‘Blue and Grey, The Colours of Love’ explores the complex and all-consuming experience of grief, and its inextricable relationship to love. Grief is an overwhelming experience that has a certain silencing effect. It can feel easy to drown beneath the unending waves of grief. I’ve found that the only way to survive is to allow yourself to be swept away by the waves, eventually you’ll float on top of them and be carried somewhere peaceful and still, inside of you. And there you’ll be connected back into love. And so the cycle continues.

My hormone/skin health journey started back in 2020 when I had reached a point in my life where I could start expanding my idea of health and wellness to include more than just the mind. I began learning about the effects of the pill and after 8 years on it I decided to quit cold turkey. I quickly developed cystic acne and a whole host of other uncomfortable symptoms. I realised I needed to take a holistic approach to healing my body and sought support from naturopaths and other healers. 

Balancing my hormones looked like:

After about 18 months of healing my body began to find balance and my symptoms alleviated, though I was still experiencing cyclical breakouts, my skin was left looking dull due to the skincare I was using and I had pretty severe pigmentation and scarring. This is when I found bluem and never looked back

Using the self love kit not only brought my skin back to its natural balance and glow but it also invited more ritual into my life and offered an opportunity to connect to myself and to nature every morning and every evening.

Taking part in the recent Bluem Rewilding shoot was a radical act of self love. Every step of the process was so far out of my comfort zone but it felt so aligned and has allowed for so much internal growth. The shoot itself was delicious and filled with true moments of support and connection, between each other and nature simultaneously. I truly feel this experience was such a powerful act of self love and a way for me to fully show up and love and honour my body in its true natural state. Bluem has continued to support me on my healing journey for years, and this experience was an added layer of medicine."

You can follow Alisha via @alishaaa_mary, and her incredible art here.