SHOW AT SUNRISE CAFÉ

I’m hard at work today getting ready to hang my solo show at the Sunrise Café in Yellow Springs, Ohio. I’m looking forward to seeing my quilts in a new space ,and I’m nervous about whether the people in my new hometown will like my work.

Working with student writers, my goal is always to separate evaluation from feedback. I know first hand how damaging praise and criticism can be. Getting ready to hang this show, I know that people will be sitting eating the wonderful food at Sunrise and evaluating my work.

I create the work for me. I try to get onto cloth the images and emotions that are in my head, but when I put it out there, even if it matches perfectly what I intended to create, it may not be pleasing to other people.

And I want other people to like my work. I also want to be able to feel that it isn’t important whether other people like my work or not. So I feel both things at once, which seems impossible, but isn’t really, when you think about it. We all know that when someone says, “I don’t give a damn what you think,” they are generally expressing a wish and an intention. At the same time, by making the statement, they reveal that they do indeed care what the person they are talking to thinks about them or their work or their ideas. An interesting paradox.

I’m happy that Brian is letting me put my work on the walls of his lovely café. If you’ve been there and seen it and have a question about my work, please drop me a post at laughinglg@gmail.com.

If you don’t get to the café to see it, I should have figured out my web album problems soon and I’ll post photos here when I get the technical issues worked out.