escaping categories
the page becomes a shape, the shape becomes an object
familiar habits and categories are worth questioning
I find myself questioning the convention of the frame and asking, ‘Is a frame really necessary?’ Sure, a frame and the glass surface protect the image, they regard it and sometimes elevate its stature. However, I have always loved the tactile experience and I absolutely believe that the page and the image transferred to the page is ephemeral. Nothing lasts forever and that the body of work I have laid in flat files and scattered in portfolios between desks and bookshelves are all just work. My work. I want you to love it, to hold it, to hang it with magnets or clips and then years later fold it up, use it to wrap a gift or tuck it into a box with a message for someone else to find later.
Recently documented work, Shaped Pages brings dimension to images printed in pairs. A rolled edge anchored, supports a dimension otherwise surpassed by the mat and the frame. My process of inking and printing objects between two plates results inn a top and bottom image. The pages are in relationship to each other, together they are hosts to the ongoing conversation held by the eyes before being passed to the heart.
seeing the frame and escaping it
is more expansive than the conventional picture frame. My morning window view that accompanies cups of coffee includes birds I try to name, folks walking dogs, a group of runners, strollers being pushed and kids waiting for the school bus. The window frame and door frame, both portals to outside remind me to go outside; walk as far and as fast as my hips will allow, grab a sun hat and read a bit, snip wayward branches, pull weeds and water - each a gesture of connection and caring for self, situated in place.
The frame of the computer in our pockets, the screen on our desktop or lap is a delicious portal and an oppressive trap. I have been trying to jump off of the feed and find it incredibly difficult to not scroll, to not witness, to click further, to sort, bookmark for later, like, love, delete.
A pair of recent pieces are mounted on cradle boards instead of being framed. The image wraps around the edges, can be held, stand on a surface or hung on a wall. I like this versatility and access to the surface of the image. Somehow less fussy.
when a shape becomes an object
I find again and again that artwork is a container for thinking. The printed page become dimensional thanks to stitching or brass brads deployed along an internal seam. Wounds. Bandaged. Carried. stitches two pages into a standing form with multiple perspectives. Witness to the atrocities in Palestine and trying to hold an understanding of what humanity has become, the exterior faces of the object show bodies grieving, bodies injured and attempts to wrap wounds and care with a vague physical memory of exactly how to do that. The interior shape is held by sand wrapped in torn and twisted gauze. Dark, expressive graphite lines mark the interior and rub off on my hands each time I open and arrange the object, an unintentional smudging. It is a fragile, sturdy piece best viewed on a pedestal at a hight that allows the viewer to peek through and into, preferably free of a vitrine case covering it up.
In all of these dimensional pieces, the brown bag handles reference the hand, the body, the care of carrying, the ability to care or the impossibility of caring enough. The surface imagery of the three open ended containers above is the random ephemera from pockets and packaging. Twist ties, rubber bands and loose fibers, old cassette and VHS tapes, plastic bags knotted and twisted before inked and pressed. The odd things we carry that we hold and recirculate along with ideas and intentions.
A work in progress is an unframed idea whose shape is still being determined with the help from some fiber dipped bees wax. Here it is an 8 shape, last week it was a tunnel, next week an inverted circle.