Random Thoughts: December 2008

I've been dragging my feet on posting this, and now that the new year is dawning and the old waning, it seems the opportune moment, considering the theme...

When the CAFfeine artists (http://www.caffienesouth.com/) teamed up with the band Wasted Wine and we were charged with creating visual manifestations of their songs, I have to admit I was a little worried about which tune they would choose for me. That worry disipated completely when they sent me the lyrics to "Wave Goodbye":

Wave Goodbye
when your brothers won't love you at all

and your sisters are strange as your skin

and your father is dying but pretends not to know

and your lips are thirsty and thin
when you stare at the old southern cross

when you speak not the tongue of your kin

you can take off your black face and stand on your own

it's alright if you won't let me in.
wave goodbye to your sorrow my friend

sleep will come once your body is fed

so keep following me to your end

I’ve a place for you laid out ahead

keep running and watching your feet

keep painting your hands and mouth red
if you want me please tell me be more discreet

help me pull my tongue unto the bed

-lyrics and music by Robert Gowan & Adam Murphy (http://www.wastedwine.com/)

I began working on a life-sized beaded "skin", using clear glass beads and red thread, and my tried and true peyote stitch technique. I laid down on some paper and had my husband trace an outline of my body, so the piece is the same height and width as my actual body. I see the piece as a shed skin, a shadow of my former self, a reminder that we all have the power within us to shake off the psychological and emotional burdens of our lives and begin fresh, start anew when we are ready to do so.

I had never taken on such an ambitious project and worked pretty much non-stop for 4 months to complete it on time for the Dec. 5th unveiling. As I looked at it, finished and in place, I kept thinking of one specific part of the song "when you speak not the tongue of your kin, you can take off your black face and stand on your own, it's alright if you won't let me in. Wave goodbye to your sorrow my friend..." I felt, after that gruelling 4 months, as though I had almost literally shed my own skin, and it was an invigerating feeling, if not a little bittersweet...like the song. It was one of the most emotional experiences I've had creating and displaying my work, and that's saying a lot coming from me.

The finished piece contains over 50,000 beads, and was laid out on a matress and sprinkled with loose beads and hundreds of small bits of thread that I had cut from the "body" as I had gone along--skin cells and tiny capillaries from my shed skin, if you will.

The finished work:

The info card reads: Saying "goodbye" is often frightening and unsettling, but it can also symbolize a new beginning, a leaving behind of the old and an embracing of the new. This piece was constructed (over several months) to be the same height and width as my own body, and I have come to think of it as my own shed skin, a symbol of my own fresh start.