Eyes, Needles and Fireflies

New series, new insights, and a new show.

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After I graduated from art school, artistic formality instilled, I traveled. My intent was to go back to Poland, but the path detoured to unknown lands.  Original plan forgotten, lost and abandoned.

This morning, as I found myself contemplating my latest piece, a memory of montaged portraits hanging in photo studios in south Lebanon surfaced.  There seemed to be no rules, nothing I had learned in school applied here. What reigned was freedom of expression above all.

Recently I showed my new project to a friend of mine. To her, the fringe attached to some of my new pieces reminded her of the Virgin of Guadalupe pick up trucks that accompany pilgrims in Mexico.  To me, it's a reminder of the shawls older women wore in Poland in my youth, the shawl I donned as a child made to dress up as a gypsy for a school event.

It all fits of course, these overindulgent arrangements connect me to my past, weave all the stories together. I feel grateful today that I get to make these ‘assemblages’ at my leisure,  take the time to appreciate all that this world has given me, play my favorite tunes and express with these physical objects those things that make my heart beat a little faster, my soul sing a little louder.

I'm always drawn to 'haphazardly' montaged photos, excessively decorated trucks, wild village architecture and other manifestations of the human spirit and creativity. Formality be damned! This journey is raw, imperfect, wild and nonsensical.

As I shared these thoughts with my Popoka, our conversation veered, meandered, and zigzagged, arriving at the story of the local bus his dad used to drive, the fringe swinging, decorative lights illuminating, cumbias breaking free from the speakers like ancient djinnis from dusty lamps. He’d buy fresh carnations and put them in a vase on the dashboard, a saint statue glaring approvingly from above.

And I think to myself, that’s the bus I want to ride.

If you're in town, I'd love to see you this Noche Blanca.

El Zapote Galery

c.57 No. 545A Centro

Merida, Yucatan, Mexico

May 25, 2024

Clandestine opening 7:30pm - 8:00pm

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