I love to write, have been writing all my life, but that is focused more on email responses, art applications, letters to loved ones and so on. I created this blog account in 2011 and forgot all about it since my life took a huge turn, divorce and downed economy, but here I am again, going to try my had at it again. It's just hard to don all these hats all the time...
My primary work is forged from recycled paper, magazines to be precise. I use People & Time magazines for my coiled works for they are the right paper weight and print process that lend itself best to my work. I don't keep much of a collection of other magazines for coiling for now it my thing. I do occasionally weave paper or collage some shapes into my canvas work, but not often. The years have passed, my work has evolved and now I have started working with plastic as much as paper too due to the natural progression of things.
an image of my coils.
In 2011 I became super busy working full time, managing my family as a single mother of three at that point, for my oldest had gone to college in California; running a monthly art crawl in my community and creating trashion (trash fashion) for a runway show in Charlotte where I started working with whatever recycled material caught my eye and simultaneously lent itself for a wearable creation. My first piece was made of paper, coils to be exact, my second was made out of milk gallon jugs, someone mentioned in passing and I jumped on the idea.
Because of all this progression I have slowly become more aware of trash, consumerism, waste, and because of my last installation I started researching the damage all this is doing to our air, land and water. It is not a sudden awakening for me, it took years for me to become this advocate against pollutants, waste, plastic. I am by no means a hippie, not at all, but I am becoming more and more outspoken for all the harm we are doing to ourselves. We are not trained to think of what we do to ourselves as much as how convenient is everything we do and hey, this convenience makes me happy. I found out we are inherently lazy too... the trash is graciously given to me, but usually unclean. If I ask for it to come to me already prepped for use (cleaned or even rinsed) I loose 80% of my source. Too much work...
I am a hypocrite myself, thought I don't partake in the use of party materials like single use plates, cups and cutlery, I do still find myself using everything else that is convenient, like shampoo, toothpaste and all the cleaning supplies and toiletries. I have not gone there yet, where I create my own supplies and keep it in glass jars, though I am slowly purging what I have and exchanging plastic for glass as I go, and I have not accepted plastic shopping bags in years, not even in other stores, I carry my cloth bags everywhere.
Because of all this progression I have slowly become more aware of trash, consumerism, waste, and because of my last installation I started researching the damage all this is doing to our air, land and water. It is not a sudden awakening for me, it took years for me to become this advocate against pollutants, waste, plastic. I am by no means a hippie, not at all, but I am becoming more and more outspoken for all the harm we are doing to ourselves. We are not trained to think of what we do to ourselves as much as how convenient is everything we do and hey, this convenience makes me happy. I found out we are inherently lazy too... the trash is graciously given to me, but usually unclean. If I ask for it to come to me already prepped for use (cleaned or even rinsed) I loose 80% of my source. Too much work...
I am a hypocrite myself, thought I don't partake in the use of party materials like single use plates, cups and cutlery, I do still find myself using everything else that is convenient, like shampoo, toothpaste and all the cleaning supplies and toiletries. I have not gone there yet, where I create my own supplies and keep it in glass jars, though I am slowly purging what I have and exchanging plastic for glass as I go, and I have not accepted plastic shopping bags in years, not even in other stores, I carry my cloth bags everywhere.
No comments:
Post a Comment