By Invitation Only, Please Knock Before Entering

This is my sculpture that now appears in "Brains, Boobs, and Backbones", at the Paramount Theater in Peekskill, NY.  It has "My Uterus" prefixed to its name for this show.  It originally was shown in "Meet my Uterus", at Ceres Gallery, NYC, so it didn't need that prefix then, and I posted it in this blog, Feb 9, 2013.  At the time, people such as Todd Akin had announced that if a woman gets pregnant, it wasn't a legitimate rape, because "the whole thing shuts down."  Newspaper clippings are included in this piece, which is made predominately of cardboard, with ears and eyes (of Fimo) on constant watch.  It was reviewed in The New York Art World, Spring 2013.

Besides the message, I'm really attracted to stacked laminated cardboard because of the light that passes through the ribs.  Wonderful material.

Yom Kippur

In the synagogue, there is a long silent meditation called the Amidah.  There is text, so it's more a prayer than a meditation, and sometimes it's chanted, everyone together, out loud.  But there is also a silent Amidah, and we are instructed to read what's given or to meditate or to contemplate what's in our own hearts.  We stand until we're done, and one by one, we sit.

On Yom Kippur, 2014, the synagogue was full, sanctuary and balcony.  The Amidah began, everyone on our feet and after a while people started to close their books and sit down.  One man in the front row was immersed in his prayer, maybe reading both the Hebrew and the English, maybe adding the alternative readings, while all around him, everyone else finished and sat down.  The rabbi and the cantor sat down.  It is the custom to wait for everyone to finish so we waited, and the respect and patience shown the man who continued praying said more about the community than anything else.  

The room was silent.  No one coughed or whispered.  The standing man continued thoroughly absorbed in his reading.  After a while, the man sitting next to him looked at the rabbi, who I couldn't see from where I sat in the balcony, and whispered something to the praying man, who didn't hear it, and who continued reading on his feet.  Thirty more seconds passed, and the rabbi and cantor got to their feet to resume the service.  The sitting man gently tugged on the sleeve of the standing man, who then looked around and sat down.

In the interlude of this man's solitary praying I experienced a deep stillness and peacefulness that more than anything was the essence of being in a spiritual moment.

Art in the Archives, traveling show, just left City College, NY, off to Teaneck, NJ

i've got a whole drawer, 300 tiny works, collages, paintings, journal entries, jokes.

My drawer                           photo Elizabeth Knott

The show is soon to be in Teaneck, NY.  Check back for details.

There Once Was a Gazebo

Conceived as “A Gazebo”, this work was hopeful about the possibility of peace in the West Bank.  But during its development, the entire Middle East met calamity after catastrophe, and the piece changed accordingly.  I could no longer festoon its surfaces with colorful Palestinian and Israeli cultural icons.   It's still a quiet piece, because I am still a minimalist, that is, making my point with the least amount of structural material, but I'm hoping it causes people to reflect, to be moved, and to ask - what does she mean by that?, as I have been moved to ask myself.

I hoped that by calling it "There Once Was a Gazebo",  people would know I meant there was a peaceful place and now there isn't, and I hoped that the two newspaper photos in the piece would convey that I am now talking about Gaza without telling people what to think.  But not everyone is as obsessed with that part of the world as I am, so if people don't get the narrative, I think the aesthetic solution stands on its own, a very important aspect of all my work – room-like, lines, shadows.

There Once Was a Gazebo

Me in the Shadow


Collaborative Concepts

The FARM PROJECT 2014

August 30-October 31

@ Saunders Farm
853 Old Albany Post Road

Garrison NY 10524

Sculpture Installations by over 50 artists

Opening Reception

Saturday, August 30, 2014, 2-6:00pm

(Rain date Sunday August 31)

Mid-Run Reception

Saturday,September 27, 2014, 2-6:00pm

(Raindate Sunday September 28)
Opera, Theater, Dance

Collaborative Concepts, a not-for-profit arts organization, has curated more than 40 exhibitions in galleries and outdoor settings in the Hudson Valley.

Collaborative Concepts, in its ninth season at Saunders Farm, invited local and national artists to place sculptures throughout 140 acres of a working historic farm in Garrison, NY.  Located across the Hudson River from West Point, the rolling hills and wooded glens of Saunders Farm culminate in panoramic views of the Hudson Highlands. Black Angus cattle can be seen grazing peacefully in stone-walled pastures.

Open daily to the public free of charge dawn to dusk

Collaborative website    845.528.1797

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