Lost-In Her Own Mind…

LET’S ART TALK:

I’ve decided to back up and talk a little more about my recent painting. I believe I mentioned how this painting just started to come to me suddenly and I didn’t understand or know what it was about, so I just painted. And I painted.

Sometimes I struggle with composition when my work is sort of happening in a freestyle sort of way, but not this one. I knew what and where things needed to be.

With no clear understanding I finally finished this work. I left it on the easel until just this past week. Looking at it whenever I was in the studio. Then it hit me like a brick. This art is about my mom. She has a type of dementia and in the last couple years her mental decline happened quickly. The issue was there before that of course, but my dad covered for her, and we didn’t notice until it got more serious. I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how frustrating it must feel to see things that aren’t there, or want to tell someone something but the words won’t come, then eventually it’s whole sentences and a lot of indecipherable sounds. I imagine how the fear and confusion would quickly turns into panic, anxiety, and anger. So, “Lost” represents a visual context of what I imagine life is like for my mom. That was a lot of heavy, personal information, something I’m not ever comfortable with. Who Is?

We’ll move on.
yes, this painting is for sale.

Lost (In Her Own Mind)

Fifty million Americans have dementia and other brain illnesses. To gather together the minds that exist and see how we can tackle these ailments together, that is the work that is in front of us: to have a map of the human brain, an understanding of the roadways, and an understanding of the traffic on the roadways. Chaka Fattah

ALZHEIMER’S INFO

Until next time.
Art is not what you see, but what you make others see~Edgar Degas

Valerie

valeriedowdy.com