Learning Processes

I had a studio visit yesterday, a process that is at once terrifying, exciting, relieving, and question forming. It's terrifying to expose new work to criticism, but it's exciting to talk about it out loud to someone who cares. It's a relief to realize you have a place in the room, to ask questions and participate, to be seen and heard, but it's a process, at least when done right, that brings many new questions and challenges to the table. I feel grateful to have the opportunity to do this, and thankful to the people that gave me their time. It's a good thing, to have all these new things I have to think about.

:: Sea Grass and Storm ::

 :: Watching :: 

:: Studio Wall ::

Studio Visits & Iceland Work Part Two

This week a couple studio visits of note. One from Amze Emmons, a founder of Printeresting, and all around delightful printmaker, painter, collaborator, and person. His visit was posted on the site, you can read the article and see pictures here.

:: the studio back in the summer, courtesy of Printeresting ::

And yesterday, I had a visit from Amanda D'Amico and students from The University of the Arts MFA Book Arts and Printmaking Program, great people with a great Tumblr (go there to meet them and see their work). As usual, I forgot to take a picture in the moment and only have the spread of work I put out to show. I had a wonderful time talking with them and hope they stay in touch. 

:: the spread of work ::

And I continue to unpack my work from my residency and look at it, starting to think about what it means and where it will take me. I recently had a breakthrough regarding themes in my work, that much of it has to do with translation/mistranslation, and the connection between language and culture. 

I had a strange experience while in Iceland. On the way to the residency, I took a long bus ride, exhausted and lacking sleep. In those moments of dozing, I would hear the Icelandic passengers talking to each other and for brief moments, I thought I understood them, and then it would disappear.

I grew up in a bilingual home and I've been losing my second language for years. With the loss of language, I gained the uncanny feeling of distance from parts of myself. In a way, I'm performing a personal archaeology, a unearthing and cataloguing of idiosyncratic symbols, sometimes fragmented, meanings lost. I'm making my dictionary.

:: Dictionary ::