Two Homes
I always knew that I was different from my mother and sisters. I grew up in a female family with our beautiful and elegant mother at the helm. Our mother was a fashionista who drew my sisters into a world of clothing, fancy hairstyles, jewelry and makeup. They spent hours together each week shopping, then returning what they bought and shopping again. I hated everything about it. My sisters loved makeup and jewelry and all I wanted to do was use their makeup as paint and make my own clothing and jewelry from bits and pieces of natural materials that I found in the woods. Our home was perfectly decorated with unique wall coverings in every room. And the furniture was covered in plastic. I escaped to the woods behind our home. It was my first studio.
The image I created represents two homes, the one my family and I grew up in and the one I now inhabit without them. Our family home is represented by the hydrangea plants cultivated for their elegance, color and beauty. My sisters and mother are represented by the yellow birds, Gold Finch, who continue to care for and nurture one another and my mother. In her older years, she is now 100, our mother stands in the center, focusing on herself. The squirrel represents me, leaving the family home and finding a world I thrive in among the twisting vines, critters and untamed, earthly beauty of Nature. Yet I can return home any time I want with my strong and sturdy abilities to climb from branch to branch.
“Two Homes” celebrates my family and displays their lasting, but now faded beauty, marked with the troubles and joys of life. Their interwoven love and caring of one another is apparent. Although I had tried very hard to understand and accept how different I am from my family, the process of drawing this image has revealed much, much more to me.
Creating this image has surprised me and gave me a sense of well being. I finally accept our differences, the childhood home I once felt so isolated from and truly love my home in the world I have created for myself.