ShePeril (Work in Progress)
My current work is a reflection of my experience living as a person with diminishing rights. From as early as the second grade, even though I was always a top scorer on any given test, I observed that my male counterpoint in class was given extra work to steer him toward college as I was relegated to assisting others to learn how to read. The rationale being that I was likely to “ just grow up and have babies”. I always tried to see what he was working on over his shoulder and work it out for myself. (He became a nuclear engineer).
The election of 2016 has brought all these memories to the forefront of my formerly abstract painting practice as I struggle to reconcile how I am seen as somehow less than a capable/whole person and wonder what might have been had I been afforded the same expectations for my abilities.
For me, the imagery in ShePeril conjures up a view of female form as consisting of hips and reproductive parts with partial heads (lacking a full brain), in other words how I believe I have been seen by others since a very young age. The stripes or bars are the idea of being trapped in this idea of what I am supposed to amount to according to others.
Using vector-based computer drawings to suggest, among other things, the intersection of body with technology these works explore the bend of line, deformation of shape, and inflection of form as they come under the influence of gravity, magnetism, and quantum mechanics. With a love of engraved and etched line as a jumping off point, these prints signal a reverence for the history of print with a bridge to the present
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Process(es)
The linear objects start as vector based drawings that I expose onto a screen and print onto a polycarbonate monoprint plate with oil based inks, then run the plates through a press to print onto dampened paper. For the ShePeril series I also learned Mokulito (wood lithography) because the resulting (though unpredictable) wood grain textures seem highly appropriate to this imagery. I worked with James Stroud of Center Street Studio to learn copper plate photo-etching . I have done a small edition of a four plate, five color image and many variations where I screen print onto a wiped plate and/or add a surface roll in a transparent color. Lastly, I have added polymer intaglio to my skillset, tried printing on two sided acrylic sheets, and used my screens to print an image that accrues three dimensional thickness over many layers of collected pigments.
