New Work, Old Work, Work Work

I will be showing some new work in the Demuth Invitational coming up soon! Here is the work in progress. It is a watercolor based on one of my favorite photographs of myself just a few days after coming home from having Mr. Baby. I remember being tired, sore from tapering off my post-C-section meds (literally just motrin and tylenol wtf) and simultaneously proud and shocked at what my body just went through. The background is from the stiff baby blankets they wrapped Mr. Baby in that also likely held so many other babies and had been sanitized to be itchy, scratchy welcomes into this world. This is all on top of some gestural sketches of Mr. Baby.

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The prompt/theme is thinking about "your American experience both as an individual and as part of your chosen communities". This is always a challenging experience but now on the cusp of yet another global conflict instigated by the United States and under an administration that can't be more clear about how little it cares for people, it felt almost impossible to make something meaningful. So i tried to instead approach the piece with the questions I've had in mind instead. Here is what's on my mind these days:

I've been thinking so much about being a mom and the concept of mothering. About how mothering is the exact opposite of the patriarchal ways we currently exist. I've also been thinking about how an administration that claims to love families and children so clearly and blatantly does not. I'm also thinking about sterilization of Puerto Rican woman, what it means to be a Puerto Rican and Dominican mother and what it means to be raising a son who is also Black in this country. I've been thinking about apocalypse and world building and stability and trying to figure out when to pick things up and when to put things down. I have no answers and I have no solutions. Something that clicked instantly when I had Mr. Baby was the idea that "this" is what it's all about. Not having babies or being a mom, but caring deeply for each other. I remember feeling this profound empathy and thinking "Oh my god, we are all this little baby. We all started here." and I also remember feeling profoundly scared and thinking "Oh my god. I am responsible for making sure I take care of this person. I am responsible for making sure he feels love and kindness and doesn't suffer.". Things snapped into a different focus and I feel like I've been reckoning with that shift ever since. Since then I feel so much more responsible for ensuring everyone has the choice to become a parent, that children have the right to live full lives without the fear of war or harm or fear, and to demand better from the people that maintain power over us. I've also been fucking piiiiissed about the care-less-ness at play with our leadership as a country. The disgusting displays of ego and the visual language of dominance has been on my mind too. I wanted to consider the antithesis of that language here.  

In the end, I don't know if all of that resonates or is visible. I suppose there are always way more thoughts going into things than we are ever truly aware of. Ain't that just the way? I'll share when the opening happens soon!

Anywho -- on to my funspiration station:

• This chunky crayon from Curio
• Girl Scout Cookies (picked up from our fave bookshop, Pocket Books) 
• Hip Hop Step Aerobics with Soul Kharisma (bonus funspiration for featuring CeCe Peniston this week!)
• The concept of granola