Greetings Earthlings!
Oh my, I never did expect to be a blogger. I had grand plans for a portfolio website, sure...but this is different. This is a link inside my brain, a place to feel out themes, form, concepts, and hopefully get some feedback. Gotta keep it professional, yet fun. Well written, yet informal. Hmm...no pressure. Actually, the primary reason I have created Possible Selves is to serve as a link with the people I've asked to contribute to a special art project I will be starting August 7. August 7-15 is my Artist in Residence term at the York Sunbury Museum at Officer's Square. The residency coincides with Fredericton's Gay Pride Week. I have singled out some people and put the question to them: "How have you experienced the limits of love?"
The Limits of Love
Beginning August 7 through 15, I will be at the York Sunbury Museum at Officer’s Square, completing an Artist in Residence term for the Fredericton Arts Alliance. This is the premise for the week:
What are the limits of love? At what point are certain people left out, pushed out or torn out of our hearts? The physical evolution of the heart from our ape mothers and fathers to our cave man brothers and sisters to present day neighbours is well researched and documented; is the evolution of love as well thought out? How is God moving us along in our ability to love one another?
From sex as procreation to women as sex objects and men as thoughtless sex fiends, where does love fit in among these restrictive stereotypes? And that's "straight" forward romantic love...What do we know about friendship and mentoring love? I can tell you from personal experience about the limits of love I've encountered. When I came out as a lesbian, my former Christian community reacted with fear, anger, hurt, disgust. They reacted with their version of 'tough love', which was to hammer me with Scriptures proclaiming the utter horror and evil I was embracing. Their 'tough love' wanted to break down my new found confidence and self love. I was pushed out of their hearts, left out of their community, and I felt like my faith was being torn apart.
For this art project I want to explore a very specific kind of limit. I want to explore that breaking point, that line in the sand that divides us from who we love. So I am asking all of you to share with me (anonymously) your stories of heart break, homophobia, and/or loss. It would mean a lot to me, and I think, on a broader scale, to our community. I will incorporate the text into a series of anatomical drawings of the physical evolution of the heart. Your participation would be greatly appreciated, and completely confidential.
To get you started, I’ve asked three basic questions. Please answer them in complete sentences.
1. What are the specifics of the situation? Example:
“It was my first year of college, and I was having lunch with my new class mates when someone started making fun of a poster advertising the campus GLBTQ club. No one there knew I was gay; it hadn’t exactly made the top of the conversation...I just sat there, speechless, not knowing what to do.”
OR
“The first time I walked into that “Lesbian Cabaret!” and saw the host - I knew I was hooked. She was in a white silk three piece suit, her eyes were ice blue and she had shocking blond hair. She was incredible...”
2. How did it make you feel? Example:
“I felt small and invisible. I felt threatened that if my new class mates found out I was gay, they would not want to hang around me. Or perhaps they would feel ashamed of themselves and embarrassed, project that onto me. Either way, it felt like a heavy weight had come onto my shoulders...and here I thought that going to college I’d finally be able to be myself.”
OR
“Just the sight of her made me feel alive in a way I never had before. At that moment, the whole world opened up...then just as quickly, the realization knocked the breath out of me. Oh God...I really, truly am...”
3. What did you want to happen? Example:
“I wish those people had some clue how they were hurting me. I wish I’d stood up for myself. Looking back now, I can see the scared kid I was. If I could tell her one thing it would be - stand up when you can, and no sooner than that. Don’t beat yourself up over it...we come out in our own time, when we are ready. “
OR
“I wanted to run away. I wanted to run into her arms. I wanted time to stand still..because I knew that by leaving that room I’d be entering back into my reality: homophobic parents, religious background, certain singleness forever...it was not the future I’d hoped for, but like it or not, life was about to change forever.”
The deadline for submissions is August 5th. I encourage you to write your story! If you are having any trouble, please feel free to contact me. Again, I would really appreciate your participation.
Cheers,
Marsha
marsha.m.clark@gmail.com
Hey Marsha,
ReplyDeleteI think this project is an amazing concept. While i'd like to say, even as a newly married woman that Love is limitless if looked at from a constantly positive perspective, it isn't. Love-it's almost the impossible, it's like an expectation-a dedication-an oxymoron, really it's like another word for "perfect"- I suppose I knew I loved my Husband when I discovered that I didn't have to follow the stereotypes of what love actually is, it was the ability to realize that perfection was out of the question, and a light went on: I love that I don't HAVE to love. Monogamy is a choice not a requirement or necessity of life. There's no necessity in finding love-being loved- holding on to love or loving only one. in fact I feel that if you can love only one, you're love is flat, one dimensional, and essentially unable to grow further. The limits of love are in the singularity of how Love is defined "you must choose ONE to love FOREVER" . It's not about one, it is about an ever growing entity. Sharing the positivity that Love stands for, in MANY ways. Sure there's the sexuality of love- but too there is a hum a vibration that attaches itself to everything a "lover" chooses to engage with. Love is limitless when you aren't waiting for love to choose, infect, hummm onto you. Love is limitless if you choose to be a lover of things in general. It's a "you go first" sort of attitude.
I don't consider myself a religious person, but at a sermon joined to a wedding on the weekend the pastor asked the congregation "how do you define freedom?" most would say the ability to choose our own path without any borders. It is CHOICE that makes me love. That let's me WANT to love. Take away my choice and I simply can't love. That's my limit.