In my grandmother’s bookcase, I found a red and black book with the word “record” embossed in gold across the front. The book is full of journal entries, handwritten notes, doodles, and scribbles. On a page towards the middle of the book, I found a note addressed to my mother:
To Desiree
For I am her (Ruth),
You are me
and
She is you (Lacy).
And for as long as that continues—
I am.
Love,
Mom
This body of work is a tribute to my mother, to my grandmother, and all my ancestors. This is a tribute to the earth and all her beauty.
My grandmother was my first teacher. We spent a great deal of our time together outside. Exploring. Learning. Discovering. From a very early age, she instilled me with a sense of wonder and appreciation for nature. I was taught that wood sorrel tastes sour and is high in vitamin C. Morels like to grow near dead elm trees. We smashed pokeberries and used them as paint, but I was told never to eat them. I learned that my Granny’s favorite flower was lilac, and the pink roses in the backyard were brought from Mom and Pop’s garden.
With my grandmother’s stories and knowledge, plants took on a symbolic meaning. I found that all plants had a meaning or use, and I became fascinated with this concept. I used the teachings and stories of my grandmother in combination with known symbolism, folklore, myths, legends, pop culture, and medicinal uses to formulate ideas for visual images that eventually became In Bloom. With that approach, each image tells its own story, but the body of work as a whole is about life and death, aging and fleeting beauty, women’s health, and motherhood.
All the images from In Bloom are self-portraits. I am very drawn to self-portraiture, because it feels authentic. It doesn’t seem natural to use a model to tell my story. With self-portraits, there is no disconnection between me and the work. Furthermore, the self-portrait becomes a document of my body, capturing and preserving my appearance before time changes it, like it has changed the bodies of my mother and grandmother. Women have complicated relationships with their bodies. Self-portraits allow me to see my body differently and brings me to appreciate it for what it is.
Flowers are a common symbol used to allude to the female body and experience in literature and art. I kept with this theme, but I did not necessarily stick to the traditional symbolism. In some of the images, I’ve compared various body parts to flowers in an ironic or humorous way. If one looks closely he or she will find allegories and puns sprinkled throughout the work.
This work is very personal to me and encompasses many ideas and themes, but more than anything else I want my viewers to see the beauty in nature coming through in these images. Let this body of work be a reminder of the shortness of life. Let us all take in life’s beauty while we are here.
