My art show scheduled for May at Q Center has been postponed until October. I'm kinda happy about it because I'm trying a few new things and hoping they work as far as keeping clarity goes.
I just started to take a sleeping medication, which I love because I never really want to go to my bed. I guess really I fear going to bed. In the last 5 and half years my bed has been a bit of a horror show because sometimes I could feel something on it. I could feel something moving on it like foot steps or some sort of a weight next me as I try to get to sleep. I try to concentrate on something else, but needless say it is a little distracting when you're trying to sleep. I forgot how nice it is to get a really good nights sleep.
Not having to show until October will give me the chance to focus on other things and really try to implement some healthier choices for myself. I would prefer for this work to be a reflective piece of a previous history and not a current one. Although if it ends up being a current one that would be ok.
There are 9 pieces in this series that catalog my experience at NARA's residential treatment center. I created them as a response to whatever I was feeling that week, and I was there for 9 weeks. I didn't have any art supplies except for some charcoal pieces and pencils. I used whatever I had available on site, so that is why there is cardboard, tree debris, and mole skin paper. I'm very happy with this work and I think I might call the series "Not For the Fire Circle" because since NARA is native focused many there thought I was creating things to be burned as a sacrament for the ceremonial Fire Circle. They also appear to be ready to be burned, something that might be used to start a fire.
The writing on the scrolled paper is a phrase or two of what I was thinking about that week. So the first week I was really wondering about judgements. I, and everyone else there, would ask what is your drug of choice, are you court ordered, is this your first time at a treatment center. All of this information goes into our personal files to place people in categories we feel comfortable with. "Oh, you're a heroin addict who just got out of prison and was court ordered to be at NARA and it's your 4th time through, nice to meet you." I also noticed that the staff/counselors would respond too quickly to peoples questions/confessions to the point that they already knew what to say and were on judgment autopilot.
People See What They Need To See, But It Doesn't Change What It Is.
The first piece I created from a green box I found in the recycling bin. And then I started collecting willow and bark and taking small pieces of wood from the wood pile to be sanded and then drawn on. Once I put them together I began to scroll paper and place them in the willow bound bundle. People would come up and ask what is it, and I would ask them to guess. Most said it was something for the Fire Circle. I realized in the context of being on 17 acres near the river at a Native focused treatment center they would be more apt to want to see it as something relevant to the space.
After asking folks what they saw I realized that we see what we want to see, so I started to write three sentences over and over, "People see what they want to see, but it doesn't change what it is. People see what they have to see, but it doesn't change what it is. People see what they need to see, but it doesn't change what it is." I felt this captured how I was judging folks or at least placing them in convenient boxes.
Everything I Have, My Whole Life, Depends On One Thing?
We Affirm We Have The Power - side view
We Are At Home Here
We Are At Home Here - side view
I've been debating on naming the show, "I"m Calling It A Retreat" because it was a way to get away nearly completely.
I look forward to having the show in October and maybe I'll make some similarly themed worked because creating these are very calming and meditative.
