Monday, February 9, 2009

#69 Senior Seminar

In looking over what I submitted for the Artist's Statement, I'm thinking the second half would have been sufficiently autobigraphical...all that "I Remember" blather may not have been necessary nor appreciated...

The best of my artistic intentions have always been selfish, struggles to find myself within the lines of a poem, the froth of a dishpan, the eyes of my child, the pixels on a LCD canvas. I float to the top of stereotypes. Black and white swirls mixed with Scottish Stewart tartan and African Kente cloth. I held myself up to the light, trying to fit my outline into those of the women in my family, and later, the women I saw on television, in advertisements, and movies. Identities tried on and discarded. Somewhat fearful of getting to the bottom of the heap and there being no one there. Shape-shifter, moving mercurially through moments of juvenile mockery, corporate anonymity, marital monogamy, displaced singularity. An hourglass filled to the brim with grains of laughter and longing and questions seeking a voice. Straining to be heard above the din of the mundane. Phoenixing. Drowning in the mainstream, shards of glass rain down from the ceiling. Straining to hear the voice inside of me as it slowly succumbs to conformity. I plant apple trees in Eve’s orchard so women can be wise beyond mere knowledge. Excavation, through silt and sediment, so my children can have fortune, or just a future. This splitting open of myself so that others may learn. Seeking the comfort within my own skin, peeling back layers of artifice, shamelessly admiring the beauty in my flaws, placing myself under the microscope, under the knife, under the mouse. These are the voices that scream or whisper through my work . The voiceless cry out amidst the entanglement of responsibilities, relationships, and roles. Pressed upon digital leaves are collages of scar tissue and promises. My nightmares and daydreams live for women who have adversarial relationships with their reflections and retreat into their own shadows, women who slit their wrists and bleed freedom.

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