"What Has Been Brought From the Garden?" Coming May 19th!
What Has Been Brought From the Garden?
"What Has Been Brought From the Garden" is my latest collection of artwork. This collection of paintings is inspired by my painting and poem, "My Rage is Like a Flower Garden", that I wrote in the heat of the locked-down summer of 2020.
The focus of this collection was to explore the theme of feminine rage, creating work that was floral and feminine in color palette, but rage-filled in expression and intensity. This collection consists of large, attention-grabbing paintings that cannot be ignored because of their size.
In reflecting on my 2020 painting and poem, I wondered, "if my rage is like a flower garden, what have I harvested from it?" The paintings and accompanying writings are the answer to that question.
“My Rage is Like a Flower Garden”, 36”x36”, acrylic, oil pastel, and graphite on gallery wrapped canvas
“My Rage is Like a Flower Garden”
My rage is like a flower garden
That is generous in its blooms.
It is hot and sticky like blood and summer-
But in the south where it tends to linger.
My rage is like a flower garden
Tangled with knots of vines-
The start of one and the end of another-
Just webs of stories woven together.
My rage is like a flower garden
Full of thorns like teeth,
That bite, and tear, and leave their marks,
Protecting the roots that are buried deep.
My rage is like a flower garden
Smoking with steam from a heavy rain.
So much so, it makes it hard to swallow,
So I carry it in my mouth-
Boiling,
Shaking,
And spilling it as I go.
Several years of my life were spent concealing and denying my anger, and I gained nothing. A lot of this was because, as a woman in the south, I was taught to be polite, to be a “yes girl”, to be what Gillian Flynn describes as a “cool girl” in her book Gone Girl.
But I learned something the day that I painted “My Rage is Like a Flower Garden”. I listened to the rhythms of my anger, I studied its substance, and I found the information and energy it contained.
In the time since, I have worked to know the strengths and limitations of my anger and how it is presented.
And now I use painting to express my anger and that is where I have found growth.
If you want to stay up to date on the progress of this collection and be part of the private viewing when it happens, you can join the Collectors Club here!