I don’t know what I’m doing and I think that is exactly what I am supposed to be doing.

QUESTIONS

Is wholeness a theme in mosaic? 

Do mosaics illustrate brokenness?

What needs to be fixed? 

What is the importance of drawing/design in my practice and in the pedagogy of mosaics 

Why is visible brokenness a metaphor for the age of destruction

​Why ​is ​mosaic ​a ​multi-disciplinary ​practice?

Is ​mosaic ​a ​sloppy ​craft?

How ​does ​de-skilling ​in ​mosaic ​technique ​facilitate ​experimentation ​in ​expression?

How does does my practice relate to climate change, trauma ( both human and natural) and rebuilding?

How do I know brokenness exists?

How do I know things can be repaired?

How are philosophies of Wabi Sabi and Kintsugi connected to methodolgies of mosaic art?

Is mosaic binary?

Marcel believed there was a longing for experience beyond the physical realms or boundaries. …”Without this sense of longing for transcendent meaning, one doesn’t notice that the world is broken.” (Jon Messerly) This urge is the drive for creativity, problem solving, seeking knowledge and solutions to repair the world.  According to Marcel, when these urges are silenced, when curiosity is ignored, the world becomes broken, not intact and without this longing, one does not notice its brokenness.

There was an awareness of my own brokenness, incompleteness from an early age

Man is born broken. He lives by mending. The grace of God is glue. “ Eugene O Neill 

Is this about the original sin?

My belief is that we are unformed, incomplete at birth. It is the beauty and brutality of the world that builds us and drives us to become whole.

Perhaps I break so I will not myself be broken again. It is a pre-emptive strike against those that would tear and scar my bloodied heart. It is the primal flinch that is as instinctual as breathing. It is my superpower for survival.

The Bowl

Today I made a break. I  completed the fissure  in a relationship that was damaged. I finalized and severed my relationship oh, my almost 3-year relationship with Ben. I needed to purge one thing from my life from my eyesight from my environment that represented the US. That thing was a ceramic full form that we had collaborated on, WE carved together we glazed together. 

The bowl represented the possibility  of our relationship; the way we give and take, the possibilities of our combined Aesthetics and skills, and the ease in which we could create together. Those were all dreams, or my fantasy of what was to never be between us. The ball itself  is  a relic of something impossible that I needed to destroy.

For me breaking is empowerment. it is the act of an unsatisfactory wholeness that needs to be destroyed, repurposed and reinvented.  it is an act of letting go of a false narrative, a narrative that needs to be destroyed in order to find the truth. By symbolically broke that bowl sending it out of my sight, out of my life and back into Ben's.  I looked at that bowl, round and complete yet it was broken and fractured. My hope is Ben will be able to see it like I do- an artifact of the past that once had beauty and promise. I imagine him opening the unmarked box, finding the bowl his hands with mine created together, awash in regret. It is impossible to see the bowl as a bowl- it is a union of two hand and lovers and friends. The bowl is now filled with the burden of guilt and disappointment, nostalgic romanticism, and severed connection. I have let go and passed it on, cut the trigger from my life.

Sloppy Craft

Craft is Skillful manipulation of technique vs art skillful manipulation of of ideas.

-skill = craft (non art, mindless production)

art= inventiveness not dependent on skill

Is Mosaic is binary/hybrid /crossover practice?

Hybrid practice Is Mosaic the hybrid practice? it is fine art in craft media like ceramics fiber.

Crossover practices maintain an acquisition of skill, which is the defining characteristics of craft (thinking through craft glen adamson)

Tension in the hybridity

Craft as a methodology! A form of knowledge and performance!

How is  mosaic a feminist art strategies (described as performative craft)

DEFORM NOT DESTROY The reversal of perfectionism

MacDonald” craft is a power tool for the disenfranchised” CRAFT AS A process rather than a perfect end product. YES THIS IS MOSAIC, community art/craftism . McDonald argues “contemporary collaborative craft practices, whether domestic through performed in public amateur or professional demonstrate a potential for complex webs of meaning and connection to community and Locale, linking sloppiness to processes of sharing and renewal.” p 14

Finishing an installation of a community project facilitated with Gateway Learning Center for Differently Abled Adults

The “sun” was to honor their late Executive Director, Sheri, who died from breast cancer in 2018. We ( The Chicago Mosaic School team) design this so the participants would be able to individually contribute without compromising the design. There 120 participant that made 1/3 of the panels.

Installing the restoration and repair of a CTA mosaic at Bronzeville and 35th street. We removed the entire mosaic which was originally instally in the early 1990s and was missing large sections and “tiles”. The reconstruction took several months to complete but facilitating agreements and contracts with the Chicago Transit Authority took 2 years:)

AND THIS HAPPENED:

I could not be more proud of my mom. She and I have been through a lot together and have had a tumultuous relationship over the years. After it all, she is my best friend and she is my badass hero. So I helped her write this op-ed about her ectopic pregnancy and the politics about woman’s choice and health care. It was published on November 15th in the Chicago Tribune and it will be in Sunday’s New York Times ( November 20th). Amazing.

Experimenting with drawing and mosaic together. Mounted paper, set fragments, black ink.