MAKING ROOM
Unfolding House:
Making Room
Folded dimensions 8” x 8” | Open dimensions 60” x 60” (two sided) | January 2020 | Ink and collage on thirty-one 5” x 8” cards | Fun-A-Day Show, Fourteenfifteen Gallery, Albuquerque | 2020 Member Exhibition, National Art Education Association
Unfolding House is a representation of all of my dreams about finding hidden rooms in a house, and of my desire for a life of expansion and exploration. For the month of January, I made 31 drawings of things that expand or unfold. Each card is also labeled with the name of an imaginary room.
The cards were then assembled into the floorplan of a house, and folded up into the shape of the house itself. The backs of the cards are collaged with various materials: old maps of places special to me, paintings I’ve done, textures I love, and even a painting by my father.
Link to Audio Story on LEAP website
Transcription
Once upon a time there was a little girl who lived on an island. She lived alone in a little house on the hill. The island was sinking and every day the girl would mark the new place on the shoreline where the water would come to.
The house seemed small from the outside but was surprisingly large inside and was filled with confusing and maze-like passageways and walls. The girl would walk through the maze everyday, unwinding a spool of yarn as she went so she could find her way back out.
At first the maze frightened her, what if she lost her way? But eventually she came to find it meditative to walk through the labyrinthine twists and turns.
One day the little girl decided the water had gotten too high, it was almost lapping at the bottom step of the house. So she decided to make a boat. She took the door from the house for its base and made a mast from a nearby sapling. She fashioned sails out of some curtains from the window.
On the boat she felt happy and calm. She caught fish for her supper, and dolphins came to keep her company and cheer her along. She set sail for the land she could see on the horizon, where she would build a new home, safe from the rising waters.
House of Mirrors–Leaving the Labyrinth
8” x 20” x 16” | September 2020 | Wooden cube, mirrors, willow, wire, acrylic, ink, and paperNeoRio 2020 Online Exhibition | LEAP: Land, Experience, and Art of Place
Since I was a child I've had dreams about houses as labyrinths or mazes, and houses that sink underwater due to climate change or instability. The house of mirrors is also a recurring theme in my art, a representation of lies or deception.
How does one find a way out? In mythology, Ariadne weaves a thread through the labyrinth to show the course to follow back to safety. This is often represented by a red thread or wire woven through my pieces. The boat has also been my symbol of safety, equanimity, and spiritual support.
In House of Mirrors, these elements come together to tell a story of enchantment and escape. Willows form the roof and windows for the house, making it a thing alive. But the windows let in no light or truth, as they are all shattered mirrors. Inside, mirror shards create multiple versions of reality, but Ariadne’s thread coils through the labyrinth, pointing the way out the door. The door itself falls open to provide an exit to outside reality, and then becomes the ocean and the boat to sail away in.
Threads of Connection: Breath, Treasure, Spirit, Blood
5.5” x 11” | July 2020 | Collage of images from the Santa Fe New Mexican, thread
SITE Santa Fe Silver Linings Postcard Project