I love thinking about
how we see and understand the world around us – and how art and exhibits inform and impact our ways of seeing…
I love connecting audiences
to art (notably feminist art) and see that as central as women and underrepresented perspectives (in art and generally) have been erased and marginalized for so long…. The Laugh of the Medusa (Helen Cixous) and Ways of Seeing (John Berger) are two of my favorite texts about just these things!
<—Me scripting Helen Cixous’ “The Laugh of the Medusa” text onto a body printed canvas live.
I love layers of meaning!
Me, making art as a woman–honoring Cixous in practice and in result through the work and action! I even got to discuss it with passers-by… Commission for Morgantown Public Libraries, now hangs on 2nd floor.
Thus, the title of my forthcoming blog series of nonlinear art reviews I’m calling – Medusa’s Ways of Seeing – a play on The Laugh of the Medusa (famous French feminist philosopher’s essay, on the importance of women expressing themselves, specifically their
bodies),
and Ways of Seeing (famous TV series then book discussing how we each come to art/life with different perspectives). Two of my favorite works combined and playing with the idea of Medusa and how we see her as representative of how we see women, as well…
I kept a blog for 10 years, Les Femmes Folles: Women in Art, and retired it last year. Before that, I had a regular gig at a local newspaper and public radio reviewing art and writing an art gossip column. Though I continue to write and publish reviews independently,
I miss the regularity!
Whether I have readers or not!–I’m going to write a series of reviews of exhibitions I visit throughout my travels this year with some random personal art musings here and there as well.
My style is accessible, with an attention to how work by underrepresented artists are displayed in spaces, and how that impacts viewer understanding and perception. I hope to inspire and provoke thought around interacting with art. I also aim for a nonlinear,
no
ntraditional approach–
contrary to my writing background–
though more in line with my artmaking–
-to emphasize the impact of viewer experience.
(Images: collage-drawings by me, 2022)
My first review is from an exhibition I visited in March in Cleveland. The exhibition, Women in Print: Recent Acquisitions, at the Cleveland Museum of Art, presented an amazing and diverse array of prints by women identifying artists…but…
did the display live up to the highly esteemed artists it presented? Stay tuned….
Feel free to send me any tips–my travels this summer include: Miami; Detroit; Columbia, MO; Omaha; Detroit; Charleston, WV; and upstate New York. I currently reside about an hour South of Pittsburgh and will definitely spend some time there.
If you appreciate the content and would like to support my work, please share with a friend and consider a tip!
Read about Medusa: Feminist Consideration.