Jubilee is a word on peace and social justice. While my own work has particular interest in social and economic justice for women, it has not been limited to that. The work itself has taught me the socio-economic pattern of global justice. The artwork I do is articulated through engaging and re-valuing the work of those who have toiled with the humble human work of stitchery. This is where i come from, I worked from childhood til age 28 stitching interior sewing jobs such as draperies, with my grandmother as the main family support. My path of art has been an homage to her more than anything. And its my own story stitched to so many others who are suffering the injustice of global economics in "free" trade. My voice has risen through struggle against this in order to survive and my life experience has shaped my art. I am proud to be a stitch in the ancient practice of story-telling in stitchery is a part of the lexicon of folk language, of women all over the globe as well as men in many cases. tribal communities employ the humble stitch as a visual voice, such as in India, the practice of piecework is called Katha – a combining of fragments of cloth to tell a story, document a life passage. This work continues my relationship to this story, herstory.
The work on these pages is an archive my prayers to empower myself during difficult times, using the process of stitchery, the skill itself. It is a mending of the broken human spirit, evoking heroic images of humanity - ultimately enveloped in the metaphor of the quilt as the spreading of a blanket of grace. These works are receptive objects, a covering, protection, shelter. Assemblages of over-dyed, vintage salvaged household linens are pierced and marked ceremoniously in the way that tattoo or mendhi is to skin. messages written as prayer on the body as a sacred book. With inks, beeswax, dyes and encaustics I uncover the figures buried in the shroud and meditate over them with the hands-on blessing of stitchery.
This is the element of the word as to a story. The word Sutra literally means thread. My work is to stitch a sacred text. The act of making this work creates a prayer for recovery and mending the Self. As prayer – these quilts are the work of beatifying. The visceral action of this work is a liberation of prayer - Prayer whether the spoken word as it manifests truth through mantra and affirmation or by any sound, movement or task which is drawn out of the body.
over 30 years experience in art making, exhibiting and teaching, my work has been established on Nantucket Island, MA, and had begun emerging in NYC before I expatriated. I gave my heart as a volunteer prison minister in a women's prison for 5 years bringing and facilitating an art program to enable spiritual healing through expressive art processes. I was enabled through a town grant for youth-at-risk to use art as a gathering process and medium to voice peace in a broken world for several months after 9/11. At about the same time, my health was devistated by lymes disease and I was unable to maintain the studio and my voluntary work outside too. So I continued on as a resident staff member at Ananda Ashram for 3 years, had set up a sacred arts space on the grounds in an unused garage bay. During my stay there, I was given the Sanskrit name Niradhara (translate: independent) and became devoted to practicing prayer ceremonies with fire. It was also during that residency that I enrolled in the new seminary for interfaith studies and was ordained at st. john the divine chapel in 2008. From there I went to india to continue my work and study directly under the master of the sacred fire shree vasant. This last decade has taken my spiritual path outside of my art working and without a home or studio. The work I do in sacred service does not now often result in any material work besides the ash created by the sacred fire. The work goes on in other forms. My artwork, when I do have a physical place to create a manifested work, has adapted in form but not in intention or in its integrity of holding homage to the humble stitch.
"Memento, homo, quia pulvis es, et in pulverem reverteis'
From an ancient Ash Wednesday ritual
Remember, you who are humans, that you are made of earth-dust, as well as star-stuff, and one day you shall return to the physical universe to become its substance once again.
Translation by Carl Sagan
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MA KARMANAM ANARAMBHAN NAISKARMYAM PURUSO ‘SNUTE NA CA SAMNYASANAD EVA SIDDHIM SAMADHIGACCHATI
“The Karma Yogi gains not actionlessness by abstaining from activity, nor does he rise to perfection by mere renunciation.”
YAJNARTHAT KARMANO ‘NYATRA LOKO ‘YAM KARMABANDHANAH TAD ARTHAM KARMA KAUNTEYA MUKTA SANGAH SAMACARA “The world is bound by actions other than those performed for the sake of Yajna. Do therefore, son of Kunti, earnestly perform action for Yajna alone, free from attachment.”
--from the Bagavad Gita Ch 3 verses 4 and 9
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Jubilee is the fullness of time on a spiral calendar... ... a way of marking time in cycles based on the number 7... ( rest / blessing ) and responsibilty ( work / gratitude ). The Christ conciousness ( forgiveness ) enlightened a response of giving back - in the moment of specific cause and effect as well as in perpetuity where singular deeds need not be returned as we are all part of the same consciousness- where gratitude / blessing and work / rest are inseparable in a graceful humanity. A literal translation can be found in the Torah, book of Leviticus.
"The Spirit is upon me , I have been anointed to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted, to bring liberty to the captives and release for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of Jubilee and the day of atonement of our God, to comfort all who mourn, be stow beauty instead of ashes. - Jubilee Blessing (St Luke 4: 18- 19, Isaiah 61: 1-2)
