On View April 6 - May 27, 2023
Frances Smokowski (2022) Alchemical Reverberations, Art Therapy, 39:1, 2, DOI: 10.1080/07421656.2022.2041332 |
Alchemical Reverberations 2020 - Acrylic and ink over an archival pigment print on rag paper 3-3/4" x 5-1/4"
In 2017, a left frontal lobe concussion disrupted my routines, but also some of the ways I knew myself. My post-concussion healing necessitated significant change: rest, stillness, and recalibration. Recuperating at home while reducing professional performance demands, I drew with a new determination to encounter the spiritual wholeness of the larger, uninjurable "me"; and for the payoff of a self-facilitated resiliency. My right hemisphere, where visual-spatial information is processed, was intact and there I remained familiar to myself. I had every reason to believe I could draw my way to a new beginning as an artist. I began by revisiting shape systems and themes that have long informed my creative process: biological growth and transformation. Each biomorphic image I produced catalyzed a palpable state change, a welcome shift toward feeling improved mood or capacity. Cumulatively, the 30 resultant drawings document inspired moments and invocations of phenomenological thriving. In 2018, I began hand coloring digital prints of my images. By 2020, a pile of imperfect proofs presented new process metaphors. "UnPreMeditiations" are what I call imperfect prints transformed via hand coloring and linear, or tonal, additions. The image featured here is one of these mixed media "uniques." By working into and within the flaws, I am celebrating how intention and persistence add lived and aesthetic value to a piece ... to a life. |
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