Spoke at UNCA about the relationship of my work to activism. Poet, Alli Marshall, wrote an article about my work. We were surprised when the Asheville weekly, “Mountain Express” featured one of my photos on the cover of the newspaper. I got a chance to meet new people from the community.
On January 21st, I went with Kimberly to the Women’s March here in Asheville. People gathered slowly. I had heard a lot of women say they were not going because they were afraid it might become violent. So we were really surprised when large crowds seemed to materialize out of thin air.
Transforming Hate: An Artist’s Book, was completed this year, eight years after it was started. We did not know if it was possible, but in March we pushed to get a few copies ready for an April PHOTO+CRAFT presentation. Entitled “Making and Meaning: Photobooks and the Social Fabric”, this Black Mountain College Museum and Arts Center panel with Alejandro Cartagena, was one of thirteen events organized by Warren Wilson College here in Asheville.
The “Transforming Hate” book was published recently. The working title was “The Proposal” almost right up until it went on the press. The work on the book evolved over an eight-year period. I want to share some of the steps that I took in order to make the book. I’m hoping that in the process I can see more clearly why a price of $50 for the book does not begin to cover the cost of producing it.
Summer has ended, the garden is not a pretty picture but birds love the sunflower seeds and bees love the holy basil (tulsi) plants, which we dry out for tea. By now though, most of the birds that I listen to during spring and summer mornings have headed south. I will miss their calls and conversations.
The things that I’m finding solace in—that have become nurturing for me—seem so trivial and mundane in the face of all the news. I don’t feel immune to any of the violence, the fighting, the anger, the fear, the taking of human life that is erupting all over the world. It’s just not what I want to talk or write about. I feel like my discussing violence and abuse won’t stop it from happening, yet we desperately need to talk.
John Horn, a Master Printer, ran his own print shop for over 50 years. I wanted to know how he handled type and the presses, and how his creative process worked. His poster, “Souls Dwell in Printer’s Type,” speaks to this relationship.
On June 15, 1984 the WAVE (Women Artists Visibility Event) also known as Let MoMA Know took place in New York City in front of the Museum of Modern Art. The event was organized by artists Sabra Moore and Betsy Damon, and art historian Annie Shaver-Crandell through the New York City chapter of the Women’s Caucus for Art. I shot photos of the protest and now, 30 years later, I am compiling a list of names of the women pictured in my photographs.
I try to keep my work and my life separate. I don’t consider working in my garden part of my artwork but more and more it is becoming a bigger part of my life and in turn inspiring me. I have yet to figure out how to incorporate it into my art. I’m learning the ways a garden has a life of its own—the squirrels dig up the seeds, the soil requires conditioning with compost, there are certain times when beetles arrive en masse, nine-inch worms now reside in the soil and the birds that consider it a paradise are constantly staking out their territories.