Thursday, January 5, 2012

Being Held Upside Down 2009

When I was putting this piece together, I was not sure if I could keep it the way it was.  It scared me a little.  Both figures use my head, and the hanging figure has my hands, so, a self portrait of sorts.  Before I glue everything down, I can put in different elements to see how they look, so I took the big head out and tried lots of variations.  However, I kept coming back to my head being the "right" one.  When I had adhered everything, and it was finished, I asked my youngest daughter, Teal, what she thought, or more specifically, if she thought it was too much. Her answer was immediate, and perfect.  She said she thought the image was about what we do to ourselves, about a bigger part of us that always wants to find something wrong, turning ourselves upside down. I realized she was exactly right. I felt  good about having made the decision to leave it the way it needed to be, disturbing or not.

2 comments:

  1. Holly, I really admire your work, honesty and the way you have used your blog to feature individual pieces of art with your writings about your process and feelings. How old was Teal when she commented on your painting?

    Linda
    greiss@bellsouth.net

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  2. Holly - How appropriate. I totally agree with you (and Teal). That is exactly what we do - turn ourselves upside down and inside out, feeling we are never enough, shaking out every last bit that we can.... Disturbing, yes. But comfortingly accurate

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