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As humans we like to judge. We apply our own experiences and moral compass to situations and make snap judgements.
Sometimes I read a post written by my daughter and it breaks my heart because the pain in her words is the only clue that I have to the pain in her heart.
Other times I will read a post written by Veronica and I know that it was written purely to get the words out of her head, to give a tiny glimpse into how difficult parts of her life are.
Amy is an exceedingly difficult and tempestuous child to parent. She stretches and challenges every single one of Veronica’s parenting skills every single moment of every day.
It is very nearly impossible to get Amy to do something that she doesn’t want to. It isn’t because she is naughty or because she has pulled the wool over her mothers eyes.It certainly isn’t because Veronica is lacking some vital parenting skill. It is because Amy is so focused on doing what she wants to do in that moment, that nothing else registers. Some of the parenting advice that Veronica receives makes me shake my head and roll my eyes with frustration.
I have impeccable parenting skills. My ability to get small and not so small children to behave is legendary. I am also very good with dogs and horses. But with my grand daughter Amy I am at a loss. So I don’t bother with traditional discipline at all. We skirt issues and avoid situations and I use distraction as my main tool.
We do the same things every single time Amy comes to visit. We check for eggs, then together we cook Amy an egg. We paint a picture or two, play with some clay, watch a bit of telly together or read some books and then we go outside and throw the ball for the dog.
When Amy was still eating gluten we would do all these things at a frenetic pace and at the end of her visit the house would be trashed and I would be exhausted. Minus the gluten we are still very busy together and Amy isn’t quite so exhausting.
Veronica and I have been talking about Aspergers and Amy, we have been talking about how there is a very real possibility that Amy has Aspergers. Now that the A word is out in the open I can look at Amy’s behaviour with fresh eyes. Veronica and I are noticing more and more things that Amy does and more importantly we are noticing things that Amy doesn’t do.
So the next time you see a small child running amok in the supermarket or having a tantrum in the middle of a shopping centre don’t be so quick to judge, to shake your head, to glare at the obviously incompetent parent. And as for the whispered advice that all the child needs is a bit of discipline, a good smack will fix her.You can keep that under your hat as well.
The images of the oiled birds weigh heavily on my spirit.
The ancient trees cry out to my soul as they are cut down.
Once the ocean is dead what will become of us?
I am hurtling towards the last of my year of firsts and I miss my mother desperately.
I can feel the weight of depression heavy in my chest, a hard lump underneath my breastbone and I can taste its sour flavour at the back of my throat. I can feel it clutching at me at the edges of my mind.
As the heaviness threatens to drag me down, I could easily leap into the darkness and stay there submerged in my own sorrow but I don’t have the time to linger on self absorption, I have wasted enough time already.
A cup was stuck in the mould and I ripped it in my impatience. As I smoothed the jagged edges and altered its shape I became lost in the moment and a series has been born.
I will be exhibiting in the Tasmanian Ceramics Association’s annual exhibition in August, the theme of the exhibition is the seven deadly sins. I cant decide between greed, pride or sloth as my sin of choice, either way this cup and its resemblance to a jagged tree stump will be my interpretation of the brief.
Our sloth, our laziness, our apathy in the face of a world on the brink of catastrophe. Our pride, our vanity, our overriding arrogance that we can control nature and bend to the earth to our will is uppermost in my mind. The essence of our destuctive human natures will be represented in these forms.
They wont be blue like the picture above as I need something harsher than that to get the idea out of my head. Blood and ashes, graffiti and despair. There wont be any hope in these pieces at all, as they will contain my anger but maybe it is better to have my anger contained in these vessels. We will see.
Never again, Carnegie Gallery Hobart.
Angela Blakely & David Lloyd
26 February – 28 March 2010
In 1994 Angela Blakely and David Lloyd were commissioned by the History section of the Australian Army to accompany the first rotation of troops to Rwanda and photo document Australia’s involvement. In 2006 and 2008 they returned to Rwanda and discovered that for many survivors there is no life after the genocide. They have lost, and continue to lose, their health, their dignity, their security and their liberty. Justice remains elusive. Never Again makes visual the voice of the survivors of the Rwandan genocide.
In 1948 the world cried out “Never again!” In 1994 the world watched quietly and ultimately ignored the genocide in Rwanda.
Ten days have passed since I visited the exhibition, Never Again, and the impact of the images and the emotions I felt are fading. As I sit here and try and pull back the memories of my responses to the exhibition, I find myself thinking about the women whose images I saw, whose cries I heard and whose tissues were also there as a tangible reminder of their sorrow.
I felt a kinship with these women, a sisterhood of sorrow shared and it was important that I read their stories, that I pay homage to their grief. I was also very conscious of the need to protect myself, so as not to be swallowed by their grief. I was thankful that I could step back and have some respite from their pain and as I caught my breath, I was very conscious that there is no respite for these women, that the images they keep inside their heads and the emotions they felt will never fade.
I moved to a perspex box half filled with yellowing tissues and tentatively picked up the headphones provided. As I listened to the taped cries of the women in the crying room, I began to cry myself. I listened to their tears for as long as it took me to read the text assosciated with that part of the exhibition, text that I can not remember a single word of. I was thankful that I could stop listening to the sound of their pain and then wondered if they had anyone left to listen to them and so I listened again.
I was pleased that someone had thought to save the tissues, to save the women’s tears. Tissues are so easily discarded and they were a powerful symbol of how easily a human life can be discarded.
Photographs in subdued colours and muted sepia tones,of dead flowers and an empty chair in an empty room. Images of discarded prosthetics, a church where the villagers went for sanctuary and were slaughtered instead, as well as portraits of some of the survivors line this wall. Next to each photograph is a printed block of text that tells the story behind the photo. Each block of text starts the same way, I met a woman today. I met a man today and each story demands to be read. Each story needs to be re-told.
One of the stories accompanying the photographs was Marcella’s.
I met a woman today, Marcella told me what life was like for her during the genocide: watching her husband be killed; knowing her children were slaughtered; feeling the spear stab her pregnant abdomen. she related how “the neighbours, the militia and the soldiers came to kill us with guns,machetes and clubs”. what Marcella wouldn’t explain is how the women were killed. She simply said it was “inappropriate”.
And so the stories go on, each one as compelling as the next.
I met a woman today. she was sitting on a gravestone at the memorial museum, weeping quietly.She held a tissue in her hand and wiped her tears. Walking past, I didn’t want to interrupt her. She was sitting on one of the nine tombs that hold the bodies of 250,000 people – only some of those killed in Kigali during the genocide.
I wondered for whom she was crying?
On the other side of the room, I sit facing a long line of photographs on another wall. Large black photographs with small lines of text with a name and age in the centre. A powerful series of photographs, depicting a whole family decimated. The Mother, one of only four survivors left from a large, extended family is the centrepiece on this wall of death and her eyes are compelling.
A line from my journal, written as I tried to collect my thoughts and process my emotions.
As I sit opposite the wall and look at the Mother’s face I am compelled to reflect on what it means to be a woman, a mother, a daughter.
The pain of having nearly all of your extended family wiped out was reflected in the Mother’s eyes and I sat staring into her eyes for a long time thinking about how we are so vulnerable and how easily it could be any woman staring back at me. How women and children are generally the hidden, silent casualties in war,how women are viewed as legitimite spoils of war and being extremely grateful for the ability to do so I walked away from the woman’s pain.
I have this photo of Mum and Amy as my screensaver.
I look at this photo every day but I cant bring myself to really have a proper look. If I look properly at this photo and look into my Mother’s eyes I feel myself begin to get all teary. So I quickly look away or I focus on my grand daughter’s face instead.
The enormity of the hole that Mum has left in our lives is only just now starting to become apparent.
Thankfully I have stopped crying every time I think of Mum,though I am crying a little bit as I write this because trying to articulate the depth of my loss makes me examine it in more detail than I want to.
Veronica now has two horses and she reminds me so much of Mum, in that she never does things by halves. Mum was an accomplished and knowledgeable horsewoman and watching my daughter with her two horses I am confident that it wont be long before Veronica is the same.
I don’t know where I am going with this post at all. I only know that today the sky is blue and it promises to be a lovely day and for that I am thankful.
David has been formally diagnosed by the geneticist as having Classical EDS with a score of 7 on the Beighton scale. ( a non bendy person might score a 1 if they could touch the floor with the flat of their hands) I am not very flexible at all so my score would be a zero.
The cardiologist has decided that a non-interventionist approach is best for David. Yay. I am all for non intervention. We go back to see the cardiologist in late January 2010. The irregularities with Dave’s heart mean that he will have to take extra care of himself and always be aware of the “heart healthy options” which is a big call for a fifteen year old boy who, like his peers thinks that he is ten foot tall and bullet proof.
My mouth is all healed up as is my self esteem. I can wear my teeth all day now without any major discomfort. I have plonked my teeth into the same category that shoes and bras belong, annoyances that must be worn outside the home for the sake of vanity. The first thing I do when I walk in the door when I get home is kick off my shoes, take off my bra and rip out my falsies. aaah.
I have been in touch with the trustees of a local nature reserve and they were quite excited about my idea of a sculpture trail. I was so nervous before I rang them,that I had to wander around the house psyching myself up to make the call. All the angst was for nothing and I was incredibly relieved and excited by the end of the phone call. I am meeting up with the trustees early next February on site. All I need to do is submit a written proposal to the committee and once that is approved I can begin working towards a major interactive exhibition in a lovely bush setting in February 2011. YAY.
I am also excited about our upcoming exhibition Perspectives of Fire and as soon as the invitations have been printed I will publish one here and then invite you all to the show.
I am working on some different bowls at the moment and Chris Jordan’s photos of the dead albatross chicks have really touched me. I am going to make a dead albatross bowl later on today and I will publish photos of it as a work in progress early next week.
Here are some bowls I made last week. These bowls are the sort of thing that I am thinking of making for the outdoor exhibition. If you mouse over the photos you can read the descriptions of what I have done.
I am off outside now to enjoy the sunshine.
I have had a very busy week. It was the first week of the Tasmanian School holidays and I have been flat out. Busy, busy, busy.
But, I have been doing stuff for myself for a change.
I went with my friend Sue, to see a magnificent exhibition at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery.
Jao Tsung-i has been described as a Chinese National Living Treasure and this exhibition of his work is just wonderful. I was so impressed by his work that I actually bought the catalogue so that I could refer back to some of his paintings that had particualrly inspired me. The emotional impact of walking into a room hung with huge scrolls of Chinese text was amazing. We really undervalue text as art here in the west. I am having difficulty articulating the impact Jao Tsung-i’s work had on me but I am sure his influence will be seen in my future work.
If you are in Hobart anytime up until November 15, I highly recommend going and seeing this exhibition. It will make your soul sing.
Everytime I go to the Museum, I think to myself, “I should come here more often.” I had enough time left after seeing Jao Tsung-i’s work to go and have a quick drool over the Chinese ceramics collection.
The ceramic horses just do it for me everytime, sigh.
After leaving the museum I actually made it to the opening of Osmosis 2009 An exhibition of artworks by twelve Tasmanian women made in response to Bruny island. This exhibition is on at the Sidespace Gallery in Salamanca until the 21st of September and is well worth a look.
The spouse has been saving for a new chainsaw. A chainsaw is an essential piece of equipment for us, it is the most important tool we possess.
So can you imagine my delight when The Spouse used all of his savings to buy me a second hand Slow Combustion Stove. I have been jumping up and down with excitement for days now, hugging myself and chortling quietly to myself with glee. I have been waiting for twenty years to have an oven in my kitchen and now it looks like I will have one very soon yay yay yay..
I had a combustion stove ready to go into the kitchen about ten years ago but we needed to put a toilet inside the house or the council was going to evict us from our property. So I had to sell the stove in order to raise enough cash to buy a septic tank. It broke my heart, but the council were happy and issued the necessary permits and just quietly a flushing toilet inside was rather nice, especially in the winter.
I have a very busy week coming up, we need get Mum’s house ready for an open home next weekend.It is going to be horrible having strangers traipsing through Mum’s house stickybeaking about the place.I am trying to keep so busy with my ceramic work that all the day to day stresses of reluctantly selling Mum’s house are soothed by the clay’s magic.
Here are two photographs of Black Cockatoos. I took these photos in the very early morning, just before the sky started to colour up. I am thinking that the second photo would look very nice on a plate.
