Into my heart an air that kills From yon far country blows: What are those blue remembered hills, What spires, what farms are those? That is the land of lost content, I see it shining plain, The happy highways where I went And cannot come again.
by A.E. HousmanExpired 35mm film from a Olympus OM10 camera he gave to me a few years ago, but that I never had opened. Just developed this past weekend.He passed away yesterday.
I spoke with mikewindy, my former sculpture professor at Flagler College, for his Drawing South Podcast. I had not spoken to Mike, beyond social media interactions, in roughly 15 years. It was beyond great to catch up and talk about art making. Mike is a great artist and teacher-and the questions and foundations he laid in that class are things I still feel today. Check out the podcast here https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/a-conversation-with-amelia-eldridge/id1548410092?i=1000693035807 . He has lots of great talks with other artists as well. And here's a link to Mike's own website https://www.mikewindy.com/ . Thanks for the listen.
ARTIST STATEMENT
“...suddenly, it seemed to me that the entire world was like a palace with countless rooms whose doors opened into one another. We were able to pass from one room to the next only by exercising our memories and imaginations, but most of us, in our laziness, rarely exercised these capacities, and forever remained in the same room.." - Shekure, My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk
Through the isolation of specific body parts, lines, and shapes I explore the structure of the human form. The body serving as an archive of experiences of space and the passage of time. Through the act of physically engaging with my materials, I descend back to this sensual world I inhabit. I use the work as a means of scrying, desiring to understand this vessel I inhabit. My desires have become enmeshed with my meditations on the cycle of the seasons, and the textures and spirits of the natural world. Techniques, crafts, stories, and ways of old that are still in existence today, inform my contemporary art practice.
I made this apron as a meditation on the role of the maid- a helper both looked down upon and fantasized about. I did not use a pattern, rather imagining and measuring using my body.
I saw the painting that is featured in the cyanotype at the Holburne Museum in Bath, England in June of 2023. I was immediately stuck by her coyness and sass, a painting born of fantasy. Who is watching her? And what do they want with her? And what exactly is she washing? What was her (or any 'servants') level of consent in this? Did she welcome or hate it? Or both? A true lady's maids hands would never be that pristine..Right.. a lot of thoughts. As someone who works in a professional role of service as a public librarian, I’ve felt like a maid. People in turn concoct their own fantasy about you, while others treat you like a servant.
