making space

I made up a deity in the form of a three-eyed hare with a flaming tail to personify the time-bending effects of generational trauma. I am interested in how we are physically and neurochemically shaped by the experiences of our parents, grandparents, etc. — events we never experienced firsthand, or even events that happened when we were not even alive yet. The archetype of the “trickster hare” encapsulates for me the small-scale intimacy but insidious power of this trauma.  

In “Unknown bridge in Cambodia, c. 1962,” I painted directly from an old family photo of my mother (center) and late grandmother (right). My grandmother grimaces in what could be horror or confusion at something out of frame, behind the cameraman (my late grandfather). Two unidentified figures on the left seem to be attempting to photograph whatever it is. When my partner experienced several life-threatening health crises over the course of this semester, I felt transported into the role of my mother when she was caring for her mother at the end of her life, and my grandmother when she was caring for my grandfather at the end of his life. In the painting, both generations stare out at the viewer, but also into their futures, into the mundane horror and meanness of death.