How Others Saw Me

How Others Saw Me

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​"How Others Saw Me", oil on paper,  13.5 x 21.5 inches.  This item is unmounted and unframed. (click on the image to purchase)

“I want to be held and told my name. I want to be valued, in ways that I am not; I want to be more than valuable. I repeat my former name; remind myself of what I once could do, how others saw me. I want to steal something.”
― MARGARET ATWOOD, THE HANDMAID'S TALE

Well, dear reader, you see what's going on in the world.  The trend away from equality and uplift; the abrupt shift toward erasure.  This isn't a political post, but it cannot help but be singed and smoking around the edges by it all.

I try not to think about what other people think about me.

What other people think about you is not your business - who said that once upon a time?  I can't recall, but the words stuck with me.  And as an artist, thinking about what other people are thinking is a downward spiral of stifled creativity and the muse bound and gagged in the corner.

But as a human, it is hard to avoid thinking about what other people think about me when they are making decisions about my life, my freedom, my rights.  When their thoughts about me (and my kind) are defining many key aspects of how I can live in the world, well then I think that is​ my business.  And yours, too.

So this ballgown bot appeared at an interesting time, demanding I ponder the thoughts of others, demanding I remind myself daily of who I am, not who others say I am or what others say I am allowed to do and to be.  Feisty, this one.  

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About the art - beginning with a large acrylic painting on arches 300 lb watercolor paper, taping it off into two vertical sections and drawing directly on top of it with a thick black paint pen.   Working from the outside in  (many layers to get that dark, dark, dark) and then the inside out (many layers to get the shades of pink and flesh and shadows) always in thinned layers of paint (using linseed oil now instead of walnut oil).  Initially working wet into wet to get softness, then a long drying time.  Wet on dry for crisp edges, and then wet on the new wet for blurred edges of fabric fading into the dark.  Push and pull, harden and soften, with a final layer of dark paint to be sure the face disappears entirely into the background.     I cannot see her eyes, and yet I do feel her stare.

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The February Reader Giveaway begins today!  Leave a comment on one (or more) blog posts this month to be automatically entered.  The winner will be announced right here on March 3.  And thanks so much for reading, sharing, commenting and supporting this space, the art and the artist.  You (and you, and YOU!) make all of this mean so very much to me. xo