Manifesting with Robi Walters

When Robi Walters calls he has just left the recording studio. The visual artist isn’t taking an unexpected foray into music, though — he’s recording guided meditations. “I know there’s a lot out there, but I’ve been meditating for so long,” he says in a voice so soft it’s practically made for such an endeavour. “I feel I can add something special to that space, like it’s a calling.” It might be a different direction for the artist to take his creativity in, but it’s a natural progression of sorts. Walters, 51, is known for the spiritual element of his work, which involves assembling colourful collages from pieces of items that people usually throw out — birthday cards, cereal boxes, old vinyls. And spirituality is no less an integral part of Walters’s own life: he meditates three times a day. “Meditation is one of the things that’s helped me get out of some really tough times in my life,” he says.

And tough times the artist has certainly had. Between losing his brother in an accident when Walters was just five years old to entering the care system at the age of six, he has been dealt a difficult hand in life. And with this, Walters explains, came a hefty dose of guilt. “Because I got discarded, I thought I’d done something wrong as a child and I thought my family didn’t want me any more,” he says. “So what I do in my art is I take things that people discard and I try to make them beautiful, so that they want them back.” Walters’s story is definitely one of a phoenix rising from the ashes — his work has been collected by the likes of Usain Bolt and Sir Paul McCartney, and he now has a beautiful family of his own. His success can no doubt be attributed to manifestation and self-belief, and now Walters wants to share his tricks.