Dirt and Constellations

i. Dirt: A familiar grounding material and our first and last plane of entry.

ii. Constellations: The translations and expressions of existence. A place for the soul to rest, gather, and rehearse. 

iii. Our Bodies: The vessel where interpretations meet confrontation. 

iv. Humanity: Many bodies conversing over separate but equal analyses of what they have found.

Inspired by the poem a map of the night sky by Bashar Lulu Jabbour, and star gazing as a child. 

I grew up in rural cattle-farming America, where children spend time wandering open fields and looking up at the sky. The lack of light and human input made for perfect stargazing conditions. My memory is full of middle of the night huddles among friends where, even though there was nothing for miles, we felt the need to share a singular twin-sized blanket. Sometimes catching a shooting star between blinks, we share those core memories, filed and stored in the nooks of our brain. But how do we each remember those nights? Did sharing space and time impact the others the same? 

Dirt and Constellations explores how language, experience, and cultural environments impact memory. These paintings investigate the tension between light and form, forcing the viewer to gather and translate details to create a whole environment. The body of work acts as an invented language, with color as the alphabet and brushstroke as a syllable. Viewers will be asked to observe the work, take in visual feedback, and process it into data later formed into a memory. Though everyone will view the same set of works, their biases may alter their recollection of the shared event.