....and I am a tangled blob of flotsam. I updated my Artist Resume today, as I am entering a new show in Gaithersburg (thanks, Taina, for the link!) and I couldn't believe it has only been 13 months since the Touchstone "District 51" show -- my first time in a juried show. Late November, when the Circle Gallery show closed (excellent closing night party!) also seems very long ago: we moved my mom into an assisted living apartment right before that event. In early December she went into the hospital and in early January she died. It was a precipitous decline.
My mom was a textile design major at RISD, had a home business lettering signs and doing calligraphy, got her RN degree when I was a teenager, and worked many years as a night nurse on a psych ward, all while struggling with bipolar disorder that was never diagnosed until she was 72 years old. She was always crafty and creative: making our Halloween costumes; inventing new cookie recipes to use up odds and ends; embroidering flowers over a stain on a shirt or a hole in the screen window. Much of my inventive, DIY approach comes from her, just as many rusty tools in my sculptures come from her cellar. (Which we will soon have to clear out, so there will be much art fodder to come!)
Hug your loved ones. Make some art. Or maybe send a silly postcard. I used to get so much mail from my mom, with colorful hand-lettered envelopes. Time for me to send some out.
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| Mom told me that she made my dress out of fabric she cut off the bottom of her dress. Whenever I look back at this photo, I momentarily think that the woman on the left is not wearing pants. |
