handfelted wool $850
“On Tuesday, June 2nd, 2020, people all over the world
posted black squares on their social media accounts
with the hashtag #BlackoutTuesday.
The intention of this initiative was to go silent on all media platforms
to reflect on the innumerable casualties of institutional racism,
including the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on
communities of color and the killing
of unarmed black men and women,
most recently Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and George Floyd.
Finally, it stands as a symbol of solidarity
with the Black Lives Matter movement.
I went into my studio on that day and began this piece.
It is one expression of the grief and pain I experience
through my own reflections on the state of the world,
and on what it means to be black in America in this day and age.
I wanted my #BlackoutTuesday square to have
a more permanent and physical reality as a symbol
of the solidarity with all those who are compelled to fight
for justice through more meaningful actions, in real time.
This black felted square is larger than the 10 x 10 panel.
It must therefore be contorted to fit the perfect,
and too-small, square space allowed it.
It references skin, as it lays across the surface of the panel:
a skin unable to lay peacefully and smoothly
and instead the embodiment of movement—
as a result of pain, but also as a sign of life, endurance, and power.”
