Self, Shadow. 2020
(Or, Dusty Divas and the Devil’s Cornbread: dealing with ourselves)
“The work you don’t want to see, but you can’t look away. This face you see is a reflection of you. All of the shadowy parts of myself I tried so hard to hide yet announced in paint aren’t only mine. They belong to all of us, but my hand chose to show them.
These undesirable pieces of ourselves, of our collective self, get ignored and pushed down so much that they want to lash out. They need to lash out, to take up space, to become something constructive or else.
And when they’re there, in the light, we can’t look away. Because try as we might to outrun or denounce them, these little parts are familiar to us. There’s a part of you that’s home in me and a home is just what that part needs to safely recede, having truly felt seen.”
To read more, visit my blog post, Dark Feminine: Why Paint Women.
