Ancient Wild: found objects study
My Own After Storm: found objects
My own after storm is about surviving something and what comes next. It explores how the past leaves a residue and how we are shaped by it. It also comments on the possibilities in the time after the storm. How when so much has been cleared away, there is room to discern what we want to come next with intention. There is something about bringing our past together with what is possible now–that convergence creates an expansion.
I took an old chalkboard/white board that represented the many years working in schools and also being in school and how in the role as student in the public school system and then as teacher, I didn’t feel listened to or appreciated for who I really am. I disassembled the board and turned it on its side and painted it white as a way to smooth things out and mark starting over. I was able to take the structure of school and employment and “boxes” I didn’t fit into and turn it on its side to be transformed into a representation of the space I’m creating for myself in my body, energy, home, and in the world.
Lineage: plaster, clay, & wire
Lineage is an exploration of genetic disorders that are passed on in a family line. This work is a snapshot of 4 generations in my family. The lines around the arches are the family members that are affected with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy as female carriers or disabled males. The piece questions how important we are as ancestors—how abstract and ambiguous ancestral work can be even though it is tracing something physical. We are the only proof of our ancestors and what they were like, but we don’t know them. We don’t know what our future ancestors will be like, but we are affecting them. The white represents the idea that someday we will be gone, and no one will know this history. I chose the arch to represent the way we are each a bridge to the past and to the future in this way. The bottom row represents my experience as a carrier and my (broken) relationship with motherhood, and it also includes two healthy arches, who we hope will become the future generation in our family.
Lineage is a recording of reality, and also a wish for the future.
Fragmented, Whole: wood, illustration, collage
Fragmented, Whole is an opportunity to consider that there are different parts of the self and some are accepted while others are feared or rejected. We live in a society where we are taught to reject certain parts of ourselves in order to fit in and uphold capitalism and other systems that benefit from our fragmentation. In addition to rejecting parts, we all experience trauma of some kind, and this causes parts of ourselves to go into hiding, become shadow parts, or break off from us completely. My hope is that this project gives the viewer a chance to recognize fragmentation, feel the possibility of wholeness, and understand that the parts need to be integrated into the core self and accepted and healed. These parts hold the key to our greatest strengths and gifts and are waiting for us to step into relationship with them.