When Covid-19 arrived on our shores, it came not with a whisper but with a bang. As an artist who focused my recent work on water, Covid arrived as a boulder that disrupted the peace and the calm of clear, still water. We as a society, and the water represented by my work, needed to change. To diverge. To become not a still pond, but a stream that would one day cut through the boulder and forge new paths. For me, the first steps along those new paths began with poetic writing and designing with text, followed by studio glass work. Afternoons spent walking by the bay refreshed me with sights of birds, clouds, plants, and other people, though masked.
Our inability to be with each other and the news of rising numbers of deaths was difficult. The contrast of the outdoor walks with the way we were living explains the sectioning of my art into halves. One half is translucent; the other is opaque. The opaque side is engraved with deep subtle lines of swirled text which relates to the work. The translucent side holds color, line, image, and also some engraved text. It lets light filter through. The opaque half prevents seeing what is on the other side. It is as impenetrable as our experience was, as the future is. The darkness we lived through contained traumas and tragedies. It held stories of lives shared and heroes celebrated. Society is working to learn from the experience. There is light in the darkness.