Welcome to my website!
My name is Jenna Martin Leitch and I’m an artist, illustrator and writer from Fife, Scotland.
My work is inspired by the treasures I find, in my everyday life and in the natural world. The joy they bring to me. The “happy” they make me feel.
I collect things; In my pockets, through my eyes, with my mind, and in my heart. The things we have lost. The things we have found. The sum of our parts. Through written word, drawn line, and painted hue; I make sure the magic is remembered and the JOY I FEEL is paid forward.
🌊
A bridge.
The Tay Bridge, heading over towards Dundee. A city I have loved, lived in, lost in, partied, rested and ran in.
Friendships forged and all of my years at university at the art college.
Exhibitions. Dreams. Plans. Memories and music.
All made within this city.
And so, the bridge.
The bridge which carries me from my home to Dundee and back again every week.
The bridge which has given me palpitations, wonder, worries, walks. Words.
The bridge where I saw a heron flying at same height. Gentle and as if in slow motion.
Fog hiding its far end. Cloaking the Law Hill. Light splitting on a mirror-like Tay, on other days.
A carrying. A traverse. A safe transit.
A bridge.
Between my then and my now.
My now and my then.
This bridge has charted my life in ways. Thus far… and today I ran it. Quiet miles after my working hours.
Sustaining pace. On downward incline to Dundee and upward incline, back to Fife. ups and downs. Such is life. One to the other. A balancing act.
We weigh up our time in a lifetime of memories. Joys. Loss. Love. On either stretch of the Tay. The flow of a river, and the flow of life itself.
They ebb and the flow. They both exist.
I’m aware of them.
Onwards I’ll go.
🌊
#JOYimprinted
#JennaMartinLeitchArtist
#scottishartistandwriter
🌒🌓🌕🌗🌘
During the short time we spent in Glenlyon at the beginning of August, I was lucky to be able to open the moth traps twice.
Both mornings. Two moth traps.
I feel like chance meetings are sometimes some of the sweetest. Serendipity, or synchronicity, whatever the weather, life is enriched.
I love a big conversation. Always have done. I love to connect with people, ask questions and help them to feel safe, heard, listened to.
Likewise, some people make me feel like I can open up. Be real and honest, and it’s a beautiful thing.
Moths, the most fragile of creatures, night loving, yet drawn to the light. Somehow, their bodies look so robust. Rounded and furry at times, they are a dichotomy and a contradiction in ways.
Then, I ponder, perhaps I am similar. Strong and powerful. In body and in presence I’ve been told. Then within, a knowledge of fragility, and sometimes I let it show.
I’ve said frequently of late, we cannot be everything to everyone. Alas, this is so true. We can be us to ourselves though. Know what feels right, and seek it out.
Indeed, seeking those people out, the safe places. Where we can be truly ourselves. Without fearing. The knowledge our stories are kept safe with them.
Drawn to the light.
Drawn to the people who ARE light.
Just like a moth.
A sanctuary.
Of the moon.
#JOYimprinted
#JennaMartinLeitchArtist
#moths
#tothemoon
#safeplace
🕰️
“Passage of time and paths eroded
The world wears around us
Ways through stone face and
gaps in situ.
Scrolling swirls,
Froth water in circles
Spinning.
Rampaging.
Settling in deep rounded trough.
Stone carved, fissures and crevice
Linear way markers of what was
Way worn
Life envelopes and retreats
With passage of time
Eroding our edges
A softening
The Glen whispers us back,
‘Come home...
Be here...
Stay a while..?’
Like the water that travels
In always gentle constant
Channels etched
into stone, by time
Lines on face.
Ours... Theirs...
Mirror the landscape
And it all continues.
Begins again
Where it started.
A new”
~ Jenna Martin Leitch
💛
We grow.
Then we stop growing.
And then…
We start getting smaller… (apparently)
I don’t feel ready to stop growing though.
And I certainly don’t feel ready to get smaller.
I still want my voice to be heard.
My words to ring loud and clear.
My dreams to be fulfilled.
My drawings and paintings to be seen, and loved.
My hopes to be valued and lived.
My memories to be spoken of.
The people I have loved and lost not to be forgotten.
I want to view sunrises and sunsets in far flung places.
I want to witness a piece of nature I never dreamed I would.
To exclaim when birds fly overhead.
To bend to watch the safe passage of a beetle.
Say hello to a bee.
I wish for the wonder I perceive in the world to be seen more clearly, and with a more open heart, for the mere fact that I spoke of it or wrote of it.
For someone to choose to listen or to read, and in turn, their life was made brighter.
Bigger (even).
Don’t let the world make you small.
Time will pass anyway.
Let your ‘littleness’ be a strength.
In the mere fact that children have the most open hearts, and we can too.
I choose to remain so.
Always growing.
Never stopping.
Ever onwards.
Jen x
#JOYimprinted
#JennaMartinLeitchWriter
#scottishartistandwriter
My journal for September is now available to read on my website www.jennamartinleitch.co.uk
It speaks of the time we recently spent as a family in beautiful Glenlyon.
A blessed few days, that rested my heart, and showed me the path forward.
I would love if you could take your time to read it, and comment back here with how it made you feel.
Jen x
💚
#septemberjournal
#scottishwriter
#glenlyon
#miltoneonan
#camusvrachan
🤍
A n t - S u l t a i n
S e p t e m b e r
I’ll be honest, August was a tricky month to negotiate. It filled me up, and broke my heart, all at once.
Surely, with Septembers arrival, kinder days must be on their way? Here’s hoping.
August was a mix of time away, in Glenlyon, and then latterly, Portpatrick. The first trip, bringing forth many memories and feelings of my Mum and my Dad. Time with my husband and my littlest. It was blissful, breathtaking, and some degree of closure was found.
The second trip, we thought and spoke dearly of my best friends Dad. A wonderful man, and a huge presence in my life. Carolyn and I best friends since the age of 7, for 41 years he stood as a father figure in much of my days across that time. He was kind, and funny, a great teller of stories, and he loved to fish. He was tall as can be, and with my diminutive stature, I always looked up to him. In actuality, when side by side, but also, in his ways. He had good moral ground, and he always made me feel safe. He likely was unimpressed by my, and our, antics across the years, but, I’m sure he loved me still, as I loved him. Thus, with time with the Port family, and friends from our Fyvie home, it was heartbreaking, and weirdly lovely, in that strange mix that only seems to occur on funeral days.
So, September, An t-Sultain in Scottish Gaelic, finds me blue, yet hopeful. As they’d want.
Today a warm wind blows, and I went to see a friend for a chat, followed by a trip to the gym, then a run. Time for me, and time outside. House and home. The simple things. Now, with late lunch had, a cup of biscuit tea, in my favourite mug, and sat with my cat by my side.
The girls back to school and life continuing, as it does. We forget them not, yet, we must move forward. As is the way with life.
Ever onwards.
Jen x
#antsultain
#september
#wecontinue
#thetinydetailsandthefaraways
#griefandloss
✨💚✨
B u r n i s h e d B r a s s
Another beauty that I was lucky enough to have witnessed in the Glen on our recent stay. I’ve never seen this moth before, and the shimmering green on its wings was just breathtaking.
Like a piece of enameled jewellery, it stayed and rested, and I was able to examine it close up.
Sat with wings folded upon the tip of a paintbrush. A glimmer itself in the morning sun.
Magic exists in the everyday, or the every night, and sometimes we just don’t see it. It flies around the edges of our lives, and we aren’t even aware of its existence.
Still so very grateful for this stay at Milton, the waterfall close by holding such significance, and I felt so close to my parents while we were there.
Then beauty alighted in plain sight, and I felt like my life had reached this pinnacle moment for a reason.
Glittering. Green. Aglow.
And we were there to see it.
#miltoneonan
#mothtrap
#burnishedbrass
#thetinydetailsandthefaraways
#magicintheeveryday
“The river flows
It flows to the sea
Wherever that river flows
That’s where I want to be”
I ran by the River Tay early yesterday morning. Having not ran in near to a couple of weeks, to feel I could breathe and witness morning light, so gentle and sparkling, was a beautiful way to start my day.
Watching the water ripple in dance under that quietly rising sun. Stopping at end of my miles, and just feeling so grateful that I was able to complete it, and in such a glorious place.
Walking back to my car, to head to work. From being solo, to amongst many. From near silence, to chatter and busy.
Life can change in the blink of an eye. The weirdness, that recognition, that life continues around us.
The normality. The everyday. People just keeping moving and doing. Ticking boxes and completing tasks.
Earth shattering moments define us, and yet, from the inside, looking out, no-one seems to know. Or notice. What giant obstacles we are facing or the loss we have felt.
A river. Just flowing. Constantly, with a direction that is provided for it.
Onwards.
We are all mere water within a river, it seems. Particles. Travelling together somehow.
Jenna x
#JennaMartinLeitchWriter
#RiverTay
#flowriverflow
Courgette in bloom 💛
I keep seeking out the tiny joys. Noticing incidental lovely things, amongst my days.
Today, this flower, which was already present, yet unopened, bloomed in full. The day was sunny, and the yellow centre shone bright. Pollen in plenty.
Next to it, our brussel sprouts ravaged by ravenous caterpillars of both small and large cabbage white. Skeletal stems stripped of leaves. A feast for the taking.
The circle of life played out. Eggs laid on leaves in previous weeks by dancing butterflies. The world continues.
Keeping things close, and small, helps us make space to work through life’s tragedies. The losses of loved ones, and the sad days mixed in. We break, and we never quite mend… we are changed.
I’ll wait for the butterflies, which are sure to appear, in due course. As they do. Metamorphosis.
Earlier on in the day, once full sun had departed, I noted the petals had now closed. The yellows still there in the meantime. Evident and shining for us all.
A flower opens. A flower closes.
Beauty in the everyday.
#JOYimprinted
#JennaMartinLeitchArtist
Canary Shouldered Thorn Moth 💛✨
Still trying to get over how beautifully sunny this little lunar soul was!
Have seen three of these little wonders this week.
A blessed few days in Glen Lyon. Surrounded by quiet, and nature, hills and a sense of peacefulness that was all too short lived.
One day I will have a moth light trap of my very own, so grateful of the lend of this one from the lovely owners of the cottage we stayed in.
Magical.
#moth
#JennaMartinLeitchArtist
#inspiredbynature
#glenlyon
#miltoneonan
My August Journal can be read now, over on my website, www.jennamartinleitch.co.uk
A space I created as a place you can go, a place of solace, of space to rest, and retreat. Into a wordy and worldly quietness.
Writing words form part of my personal toolkit. A survival kit of sorts, these writings serve as to settle my ideas, and form them into small collections, that help me feel my way through the year. You hopefully also. That has always been my hope.
This months words, are of travel, and of our world and it’s increasing temperatures. The worry this has set in my bones, and the ways I know my Dad would respond, in small actions.
The small actions I try to implement in my own days now also.
Click the link to have a read. There are many now, journals from many months, and I would love if you would take the time to read them at slow pace, in quiet corner, or shade within your own garden or nature space.
Jen x
#JOYimprinted
#JennaMartinLeitchWriter
#JennaMartinLeitchArtist
#scottishartistandwriter
#wordstosoothethesoul
Lighthouse Day
🤍
#lighthouseday
#mydad
#lighthouseofwords
