"You choose. That's what this says to me: whether it be praise or surrender, to dance or cry, to be still or move . . . this picture says a lot to me about the power of a woman who chooses". D.L. Reid
These shots done back in March 2014 by the immensely talented photographer Gus Bennett, Jr of New Orleans for his New Orleans People Program.
This fall I will be teaching an art quilting class entitled "(For the) Hard Headed Women" with an exhibition to follow in March 2015: Standing in the Shadows (no More) at the Ashe Cultural Art Center in New Orleans. The Hard Headed Woman & Standing in the Shadows exhibition is part of my Fig Tree Project based on the Bible Scripture in Micah44. That Scriptural prophecy resonated for me in many ways.
The purpose of the project is multi-fold. Also feeling honored to be a participant in Mr. Bennett's New Orleans People's Program is layered. On a personal level, I'm at a stage more then ever to not be in the shadows though some who know me would balk at the idea of my being in the shadows at all! But 5 of the last 6 years, I felt like I was, that somehow I had lost me starting a forced "sabbatical" one not of my liking or choosing.
Now reflecting back, I see that time as a molding, a shaping that will render a deeper rhythm while I'm reemerging. The "shadows" have been embraced, the stories & experiences that were reaching out sometimes whispered, sometime with a plaintive cry,will definitely frame with not only my art but in other ways yet to be rediscovered.
just in the last several months, I thought I was feeling like my old self until I came to grasp I had not. I actually came to be a far better me & what has been showing up, I really liked. I've always liked me, but this enhancement is even juicier.
There was no major, dramatic made for TV moment that cause this to happen.
I simply was ready...
This Hard Head Woman was ready...
"Sometimes it is the smallest decision that can change your life"~ Keri Russell
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