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Join us in November for First Friday!Friday, November 6th 4-8pm
Lupita Carrasco - Bottom's Up
Sara DeRose - Apology Tour
Susan Quin Horsfall - Kaleidoscope
Melissa Porter - I's, My's & Me's
I’s, My’s & Me’s is a body of work about that contradiction.
My work questions identity and value through distorted beliefs, fragmentation, collage, and self-portraiture. This new body of work is larger, more physically assertive, and more vulnerable than anything I have made before. The scale is intentional. After a lifetime of learning how to make myself smaller, I wanted to make something I could not hide behind.
For much of my life, I was a supporting character in the lives of others. I became who and whatever I needed to be. I learned to anticipate, accommodate, please, and adapt. These were survival skills, and for a long time I mistook them for personality.
It wasn't until my divorce in 2016 that I seriously considered a question that seemed almost embarrassingly simple:
What do I want?
Years later, I have a better answer to that question.
Now I am asking something harder:
Who do I want to be?
Who am I when the people, roles and expectations that once defined me no longer do? Who might I become if nothing is preventing me from becoming her except myself?
-Melissa Porter
Apology Tour is born of my love of slow fiber crafts , the oddness of middlescence , and an unreasonable amount of curiosity about people I will never meet .
I think in words and pictures for others for a living , so my brain naturally orients this way all the time — collecting, crafting, connecting things to make meaning. I was curious — what would doing the same work, in a completely different context, without all the capitalist constraints (fast! make a profit! be original!) produce?
The process became the purpose (slow! cheap! borrowed!): photographs of strangers , someone else's language of confession , and my own hands, slowly, with a needle. Embroidery takes real time — an hour for a line that takes five seconds to say, even less to think — and that intentional friction around the binds that tie us, felt like the point.
I don't know these people or their lives. I don't know what they are sorry for, if they'd want an apology, or from whom, or for what. I created this show anyway, because I think most of us are overdue to slow down and say the things — to someone, to ourself, to no one, to whoever's still looking.
-Sara DeRose
This past January, right before a snow storm, an emaciated dog showed up at my son’s house, clearly searching for help. My son couldn’t keep her, so I offered to take her in and search for
her owners. She was young, no more than a year old, no microchip, a bag of bones, reeking of urine. Over the next weeks, no owners responded to the Facebook post or Humane Society
listing. Our neurotic German shepherd made fast friends with her, they mirrored each other’s poses and chased each other endlessly. My kids named her and she became more ours with
each passing week. As she chewed up leashes, obliterated toys, ate through extra bags of dog food, and finally dug holes in my garden, I begged my son to take her back…she remained. In
late September, I finally got her scheduled for her spay, shots, and microchip. The appointment confirmation read, “Goose Carrasco.” She was officially ours.
For this show, I was originally working on pieces reflecting personal transformation, and identity. Exploring deep changes in my world that have asked me to show up differently in my life over
the past three years.This art needed me to move very slowly, to be in spaces of silence. That however, is not my current reality. The beautiful life I tumble through presently has not slowed.
While I’m a believer of letting my art reflect where I am in life, I chose to express a wink of laughter instead.
One day while agonizing about the paintings I was working on for this show, I came across a funny picture of Goose in “sploot” position on my bedroom rug. I laughed and exclaimed,
“This is what I should be painting!” I joked with my kids about how I was going to paint a whole show inspired by the dog I didn’t want to keep and that the paintings would all be butts. They laughed
and called me a weirdo but as they saw the first handful of studies completed, they began recruiting their friends to send pictures of their dog and cat butts.
The studies were my favorite to paint, quick little moments of silly observation. Joyful gems that worked easily into my busy days. I noticed how each pet butt carried its own energy, guiding my
brush in a unique way each time. I am an observer of things, morning light and shadow play,
reflections, patterns, textures, angles, colors and how they engage. These are the things that
nourish me daily. This has been the most light hearted and delightful collection I’ve ever created
and it was just what I needed to help me continue walking through these difficult days. I know
these butts will bring smiles and laughter to many more and I hope they inspire countless
moments of joyful observation in others. Goose Carrasco is the star of the show! I like dogs. I
like dog butts. I like cats. I like (painting) cat butts.
-Lupita Carrasco
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