womens beyond border logo

BOXES beyond borders

Tag: USA

An Old Song

Recently, a collection of my poetry entitled, Common Ancestry was published by Mille Grazie Press. The title of the poem and several others, including An Old Song, were written remembering my grandmother, Curruth Drummond Kincaid. Her picture as a young woman graces the cover of the book. All that I do- from poetry to politics- has its genesis in my grandmother’s life. She always spoke of the influences of her grandmother, Chestine Foster, and her aunt, Ada Foster. I was her firstborn grandchild and went to live with her in Marion, North Carolina, just before my 5th birthday in 1948. She died in 1997 at the age of 97. Here I have used her picture taken at age 94. The picture of me, circa age 45, was taken by my friend, Specs Powell.

This box is covered with purple star-studded paper which wrapped a book I received as a thank-you gift from a teacher and friend, Marianne Rossant. The book was her mother’s memoir of growing up in Egypt and in France, the birthplaces of her parents. My friend, Margaret Matson, instructed me in the art of paper maché. The poem is printed on a computer scanned version of the wrapping paper. The star on top of the box, part of a gift from my friend, Abigail Albrecht, symbolizes my namesake, Sojourner Truth, whose dying words were, “I’m going home like a shooting star”.

Thanks for the help to Rod Rolle, Margaret Matson, and Tom Long.

AN OLD SONG
Sojourner Kincaid Rolle

I have no new voice
it is the same old voice
the voice of my mother
calling
for her daughter
captive of Kaleidoscopic mirrors
the voice of her mother crying
for her daughters
lost
in the mill village
singing for the hill pople
dancing for nickels

Old as the voice of her
mother screaming for
daughters taller than
herself   tall as the
Carolina pines   taller
than her predators
tall enough to speak
above heads of
inferiors   old as
the voice of her mother
singing from the deep
recesses of her humming
heart   deep where
the memory began
to be played over
for the forgetting

Narcissism, Me, Me, Me, etc.

My box is titled ‘Narcissism, Me, Me, Me, etc.’ because I live in the dream capital of the world where appearance is paramount, and hope springs eternal.

According to the myth of Pandora, when the winged souls, the 10,000 woes, the spites that plagued mankind, were released by Pandora from the jar, only HOPE was left behind in the jar, and it was delusive HOPE that discouraged the mortals, through her lies, from committing a general suicide.

Because I live in Los Angeles, California, surrounded by vain, foolish, mischievous, idle and beautiful women, such as Pandora, I felt compelled to turn my box into an anti-feminist statement, that Pandora would have appreciated.

Mother’s Love

A Mother’s Everlasting Love

From that very first breath we take
That first moment when we awake
We feel the warmth of her embrace
See the wondrous smile on her face

Through the years of joy and sadness too
She’s always there to comfort you
When time then comes to leave the nest
She’ll miss us knowing it’s for the best.

When her turn comes, her job now done
She’s cared for you and everyone
Within that treasured family
Her love continues for you and me.

Nest

My grandmother gave me a necklace with a mustard seed enclosed in plastic when I was a young girl. She told me about faith. Having faith in God, in life, in myself, and if I had faith the size of a mustard seed I would be all right. I remember her often, especially during hard times, when it is so hard to have faith; but, maybe, faith only has to be the size of a mustard seed.

The mustard seed is enclosed in resin, in a nest of words, from an old sacred book of poems about love and life, sitting on a spring…waiting.

Box Camera

Box Camera reflects our life-long commitment to the photographic arts from traditional to digital. It is an homage to earlier technical forms of imaging.

The tintype of the woman with books hints at Penny’s profession as a librarian and bookseller and incorporates the idea of educating women to expand their boundaries. Photography is a universal language crossing all borders.

Hope Chest

If wishes were horses, then little girls would ride… we bind ourselves with chains of obligations, decorate our selves with symbols of the things we cherish, the very things that tie us to life and yet keep us from our frivolous dreams.

A Moroccan Bath

I have always been fascinated with texture. On my travels I photograph details in architecture and local objects which I then bring back to the studio and recreate on canvas. The paintings I show in my exhibitions revolve around the theme of texture, color and architecture. When I received the box, I was challenged with the sculptural object which turned into a base that used tile in various shades and was inspired by them for this particular project. To add a little humor, I added the bather relaxing with her arms in the air taking in the moment.
 

Heroines

I am personally concerned with spiritual and creative identity through the abstract form. I find that creating many layers in my paintings builds a foundation or history of the statement I am trying to make. I want to obliterate as much traditional form as I can, yet still evoke images through layers of paint, glazed, and stains.

Painting, for me, can be a very lonely and difficult process. It is also exhilarating. In my personal experience I find that painting is the most powerful expression of my life and a most satisfying way to express my own humanity.

Break Water

Borders are changing lines on our world’s map that demarcate culture, land, time, history, ethnicity.  These are intellectual separations, but the older physical lines of division are also lines of connection- the oceans that separate us, join us.  Water is the vehicle for life- our food, our bodies, our planet.  Women share the experience of our body’s potential to transmit new life.  Our female bodies are both the source of our common oppression and transcendence. Break Water recalls the moment that proceeds birth.  The image is simultaneously bound and released, evoking change, possibility, destruction, hope.  I have included materials from previous works; a Xerox transfer image of a rope sculpture I made across a rotten East River pier in New York City, and two eggs which I collected in Brazil during a women’s collaborative show.  These are symbolic “births” of new ideas and images that women artists are collectively making to Break Water and change the marks that divide us.

Following Examples: An Exhibition

Because I am a curator and not an artist, I decided to organize a miniature show for Women Beyond Borders. The 10 featured artists were given a dimension of 1-1/4 x 2-3/4 inches and told to make something flat. The visual artists I invited are people whose work, lives and friendships have inspired and informed my life in a meaningful way.  This is an extremely personal project and I wish I could have included something by all the others whose creative lives have proven to be exceptional examples to follow.

Barbara Berk
Angie Bray
Karen Brown
Jacqueline Cooper
Eileen Cowin
Kim Cridler
Kathy Haddad
Danielle Imperiale
Sari Roden
Liza Ryan

Women’s History/Prehistory

Black Box- Hidden Wisdom, what we know and have forgotten

Black Stone- For the Great Black Magma Mother

Opening Book- History of Women’s Mysteries, linked one to another, through our Blood, through Time.

Images are not designed to explain, but to expand awareness.

Flor de Canela

My box is an expression of myself. Now others will know who I really am.
I did not have an original box, but built a bigger one with my husband. All objects and photos are symbolic.

Apricot Box

From childhood through adulthood- fairy tales, myths, and even nursery rhymes follow us about, shaping us, forming us.  At an early age, we learn that beauty equals good, and ugliness equals bad.  We also learn something about the narrow range that is supposed to define a woman’s safety zone.

Miss Muffet sits and minds her manners, and even then, is frightened away by a spider, while Little Jack Horner gets to stick his thumb in the middle of a pie, pull out a plum, and thinks to call himself a good boy for having done so.

Apricot Box is about women reclaiming for themselves, the ripe, fruity, fragrant, luscious parts of ourselves, and about little girls, never losing it.

 

Re:Mapping

When I was asked to create a box for this project, I wanted to use ideas and images representing the spirit behind Women Beyond Borders. I found a 1957 atlas with a world map and an accompanying text, which are very anachronistic relics of the Cold War era. More than 40 years later we have seen a myriad of changes in borders resulting from our late 20th century, capitalist, post-colonial, multi-national, global politics. More importantly, we know only too well the tragedies that have ensued when multitudes of human beings are displaced and dislocated from their homes and homelands.

On this box I attempt to re-map the world to show the arbitrary and contrived nature of geo-political borders. While many countries appear as they are today, some nations no longer exist and others have yet to be established. I have tried to de-contextualize the borders to remind us how they are always in flux. Inside the box is an idealistic and paternalistic text fragment from the atlas, a bittersweet reminder of a 1950’s American dream that has all but collapsed as we approach the year 2000. The text on the lid is my own bit of wishful thinking: Even though boundaries will undoubtedly persist to exist, hopefully they will not continue to prevent us from moving freely across borders.

 

Letting It All Hang Out

This box is sort of a self-portrait.  It is about me, anyway.  It represents some of the things inside of me that I like, get pleasure from, are positive and good, and that I am grateful for in my life.  It’s a celebration.

 

Cancer

In the past
people asked me
sometimes
what is your sign
and I said
cancer
because I was born
on the 6th of July.

Now I got the disease
or the disease got me
and I hate
this word:
cancer.

I lost my hair
I lost my breast
and I may lose
my life-
who knows-to
cancer.

But I am not alone
185,000 women a year
are getting it and
we are all asking why
cancer

Why all the poison
in our food, our water,
our air, what did we
do to nature, where
is the F.D.A.? It is not
only tobacco which is
killing us.  How can we
fight the enemy
cancer?

 

Song From the Earth

My work celebrates the Native American philosophy of centering one’s life in the natural world.  This is both a conscious and instinctual commitment.  Rather than illustrate this idea, I use materials to suggest our relationship to the earth.

On the brink of the new millennium, let us all be mindful of celebrating and preserving the earth’s gifts. This should be a universal concern.

Beyond Bounds and Borders

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Barbro Sachs-Osher, CONSUL GENERAL OF SWEDEN IN SAN FRANCISCO, CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD FOR THE BERNARD OSHER FOUNDATION and Ulla de Larios, ARTIST

This box honors Barbro Sachs-Osher whose generosity goes beyond bounds and borders.

The Shape of Silence

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Dr. Sara Bunting, SILICON VALLEY INTERNIST and Tess Sinclair, ARTIST

“We hear the rain, but not the snow. A day well lived must know the shape of silence.” –K. Nerburn

Competent. Dedicated. Compassionate. Multitasking… Exhausted.

So many women from so many different circumstances live these words. Women are tenderly caring for those in their stead, watching and vigilant for sounds of an aching heart. Dr. Sara Bunting is one such woman. And she is tired.

Reclaiming time for recreation…re-creation and solitude is the task awaiting us. Take time to know the shape of silence.

Come on Breathe!

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Dolores Huerta, SOCIAL ACTIVIST, LABOR LEADER AND CO-FOUNDER OF UNITED FARM WORKERS

Grace Elizabeth Davis, WRITER, MOTHER AND MARATHON RUNNER

These trophies are awards to the plights that we face as women.

Dolores Huerta wanted to help her students who came to class barefoot and hungry. Through her community work she co-founded the United Farm Workers Union. At 76 years old she continues to lecture and lobby for the UFW, a model used by global labor unions as a testimony to the rights of workers.

Grace Davis, writer/runner/mother, known for “Katrina Relief” brought aid to the hurricane victims of New Orleans, the first to use blogging as a medium in disaster relief.

In our endeavors, our lives can be in danger, our pasts can haunt us, our vulnerabilities can be exposed.

Unselfishly, women strive to be all things to everyone; we endure the odds guided by our passion to care for our world families.

State of Grace

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Grace Elizabeth Davis, WRITER, MOTHER AND MARATHON RUNNER and Terry Acebo Davis, ARTIST

These trophies are awards to the plights that we face as women.

Grace Davis, writer/runner/mother, known for “Katrina Relief” brought aid to the hurricane victims of New Orleans, the first to use blogging as a medium in disaster relief.

In our endeavors, our lives can be in danger, our pasts can haunt us, our vulnerabilities can be exposed.

Unselfishly, women strive to be all things to everyone; we endure the odds guided by our passion to care for our world families.

Dolores Huerta: Social Activist, Labor Leader, and Founder of United Farm Workers

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Dolores Huerta, SOCIAL ACTIVIST, LABOR LEADER AND CO-FOUNDER OF UNITED FARM WORKERS and Terry Acebo Davis, ARTIST

These trophies are awards to the plights that we face as women.

Dolores Huerta wanted to help her students who came to class barefoot and hungry. Through her community work she co-founded the United Farm Workers Union. At 76 years old she continues to lecture and lobby for the UFW, a model used by global labor unions as a testimony to the rights of workers.

In our endeavors, our lives can be in danger, our pasts can haunt us, our vulnerabilities can be exposed.

Unselfishly, women strive to be all things to everyone; we endure the odds guided by our passion to care for our world families.

Ambient Light

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Amy Reisenbach, DIRECTOR OF CURRENT PROGRAMMING FOR CBS PARAMOUNT TELEVISION and Sukey Bryan, ARTIST

When Amy and I talked on the phone, I was very moved by her embrace of the people around her, her enjoyment of her work, and pleasure she gets from being in nature. A significant experience that we hold in common is that we have both lived through the death of members of our immediate families. Several times she said, “Don’t take things for granted”.

I covered the entire box with an image of water, an ever-changing and unpredictable source of life — as a metaphor of awareness and appreciation of the life and lives that surrounds us. The inside of the box and the inside of the lid are gold like the constant inner self that reflects light.

 

Separation

Vietnamese / American Boxes

April 1975, Vietnam: Everyone knows the communists will over run Saigon, but no one expected it to happen so fast. Over the last month the sound of gunfire and explosions have slowly increased in frequency and force. We are so used to it that it has become a sort of background noise no one pays any attention to. Despite this I remember waking on April 30th, alarmed at how close the sound of gun-fire and explosions was to our neighborhood. The city was in chaos, dark smoke blanketed the horizon as people ran with whatever belonging they could carry. But as I watched it seemed that very few had any idea of where to go.

My family and I hurriedly packed some clothes and fled to a friends house in another part of the city called Cho-Lon which was safer. We could no longer stay in our home because it was near an army camp and therefore dangerous. My father was not with us because he and my mother had separated years earlier. Adding to our anxiety was a rumor that the communists have threatened to flatten Saigon if there is resistance. By noon the presidential palace had fallen and we knew it was all over. I was only 7 years old at the time and did not realize how bad the situation was, so I innocently told my mom that now Vietnam will be one country again so she can go back to North Vietnam to see grandmother. My mom was delighted with the thought.

Later that afternoon we drove to the harbor to see what was going on since the radio station had been captured by the communist and we no longer were getting any news. As we drove around the streets were now completely deserted and an strange silence had fallen on the city. The only people we saw were a few people left still burning records and documents in front of some government and military installations. More ominous was the fact that in the harbor most of the navy and merchant ships had already left. I asked my mom what was going on but she seemed lost in her thoughts, maybe she was thinking of the harsh choice she would soon have to make.

My uncle and his wife had been staying one step ahead of the communists since they fled the central highlands. Because of the speed of the communist advance, the roads were jammed with refugees fleeing south making progress impossible for vehicles. Even though they did not want to be separated, my uncle was forced to put his wife on one of the boats heading to Saigon because she was pregnant and would never be able to keep up on foot. When he finally made it to Saigon a few weeks later, he found out that his wife has not arrived and not knowing where she was or what else to do, decided to stay with us in hope that she would find him. Later we learned that the boat she was on had unexpectedly dropped everyone, including his wife, off at Cam Ranh Bay (another city in the central highlands) to go back north for more refugees. My poor aunt was unable to find a way to get to Saigon until after the fighting was over and escape was impossible.

Meanwhile for the rest of us, time was running out. We knew that if we were going to leave it had to be now. We waved down one of the few remaining navy boats which was headed out to sea but stopped to pick us up. At this time not everyone was willing to escape by boat so while it was crowded, there was none of the panic and fighting such as I saw in the photos taken at the American Embassy that day as the last helicopters were leaving. The gun-fire was getting closer and my uncle was torn between staying to look for his wife and escaping, he was worried that he and his wife would face retribution if he stayed because he had been in the army. My mother was hesitant to get on board because she had to choose between leaving with us or staying so that she could see her mother for the first time since 1954 when north and south Vietnam were separated. Finally she decided to stay and promised to find us after the war ended. As the boat pulled away I can still remember my mother standing on the dock, crying and waving to us. I was yelling : “Stop the boat, go back and get my mom”, but it was too late. In those few minutes my family was torn apart and for last time I saw Vietnam. As my mother watched the boat leaving with her children she was overcome with grief and changed her mind. Desperately she stood at the dock for five hours waiting for another boat to take her out to our ship, but none came.

On the way out of Saigon, we saw hundreds of returning boats and some of them warned us not to go on because troops were shooting at any boats trying to escape to the open sea. The people on our boat were very determined and decided to take their chances and leave.

Many of the boats we saw leaving were severely overloaded and one of the ships had run aground in shallow water. Our smaller boat pulled alongside the old, rust streaked ship and an agreement was reached that everyone who wanted to could transfer from our boat to the ship, and in return our boat would help pull the ship into deeper water. After struggling for three or four hours both vessels finally reached deep water and all passengers were transferred. The small boat turned back toward Saigon, taking a few people who had changed their minds and decided to go back. The ship, even more overcrowded than before slowly headed out to the open ocean for the long dangerous voyage ahead. Even though we had made it out of Saigon there was no celebrating, everyone was dwelling on what they had left behind and what the uncertain future would hold. That night was pitch black, there were no lights on our ship or on shore. We watched fireworks shooting up from the coastal villages into the dark sky. The communists were celebrating their victory and we could hear one of the generals broadcasting a new set of rules which he called ” the ten commandments “. These commandments were to govern life for those left behind in the new Vietnam. Our intended destination was Singapore and we slowly headed south. The weather was good and if it were not for the grim circumstances I might have been able to appreciate the beauty of the blue ocean and the small islands we passed. Once we saw some whales which terrified everyone because they were nearly as large as our ship and came very close. When I look back on the event, I think that everyone leaning over one side to watch the whales was more dangerous to the ship than the whales themselves.

Things started to go seriously wrong a couple of days into the journey when our engine broke down. I guess this was not very surprising considering how old and decrepit our ship was to start with. There were many more small boats from coastal villages followed us and dumping refugees onto our ship each day. The water started to coming in from an existing hole on the side of the hull of our ship which is now below the waterline because of the refugees’ weight. After drifting a few days, our food and water were running out, making an already bad situation very desperate. People started to fight over food and water. Everyone was being very careful to ration their water and food except for this popular singer from Saigon who would use a great deal of her small supply of water to wash her face each day. Obviously some people are more afraid of being unattractive than dying.

Everyone thought that we were going to die slowly and horribly, despair settled over the ship like a numbing fog. A man near me decided not to wait and shot himself in the head. I remember screaming when his blood and brain tissue splattering on me. On the crowded deck there was no where to store the body so there was no choice but to toss his body overboard and within minutes the sharks were fighting over it. As days passed, so great was my fear and loss that I felt neither hunger or thirst. My mind had cut off my ability to feel or comprehend what was happening around me, which was maybe a good thing considering what life was like onboard. Even though the ship was extremely overcrowded there was very little talking, everyone seemed wrapped up in their own misery. My brother and sister sat nearby crying and hugging each other. The crowding was so great that one night when I stood up to stretch, I found that I could no longer find a space to sit back down so I ended up standing the entire night until I collapsed. Having learned my lesson I did not get up again until we were rescued.

Despite our SOS signals and desperate attempts to get their attention, many ships passed us by without stopping but finally after floating what seemed like forever we were picked up by a Danish freighter out of Thailand on their way to Hong Kong. After being left by so many other ships, everyone was afraid that if we did not get onboard the freighter fast enough they would leave without us. Most of the people started to panic and there was a lot of pushing and shoving to get on board. Some fights even broke out and many passengers left their personal belongings behind in the mad rush. One man’s leg got crushed between the two ships when they collided into each other. Many others fell into the water and drowned during the rescued. By the time we were rescued, I could not move my legs because of sitting in one spot for so long; I had to be carried up to the freighter by one of the ship’s crew. That night as I was resting from my ordeal someone stole all the cash and jewelry that my mother had given me.

So when it was over all I had left of Vietnam were memories of people and places that had been left behind. For many years afterward, I would get angry when I thought about what had happened and what I lost. I was not angry at anyone in particular, rather I was angry how events and ideologies which I did not understand could take me from everything I knew and loved. After my mother and other members of my family have moved here recently, I finally have the chance once again to know the family I lost twenty years ago.

 

Justica

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Julie Su, Esq., LITIGATION DIRECTOR, ASIAN PACIFIC AMERICAN LEGAL CENTER, RECIPIENT OF THE MACARTHUR GENIUS GRANT and Nancy White, ARTIST

Too often, we fail to think about where the clothes we wear actually come from. Clothes, like this necklace, are worn, but they are also made—made of fabric sewn together by human beings. Women workers are the faces behind the garments we wear, hidden as in this locket, invisible, yet upon closer examination, resilient, strong, able to rise up against exploitation and sweatshop conditions to raise one voice, in many languages, for justice.

 

 

Art Box

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Yvonne Banks, Owner of Art Consulting Services and Marie Hassett, artist.

Yvonne Banks is passionate about art! She has been instrumental in bridging the art world with the rest of our community for over 20 years as an art consultant and former gallery owner. Art Box is a tribute to her contributions. Her own vision and tireless energy strengthens her advice to young women, “You can do anything if you’re willing to work to get there.”

It was my pleasure to spend time with Yvonne sharing stories from our lives, finding commonality in our experiences as mothers, gardeners and lovers of art.

Framing Life, Memories, and Wisdom

Tajima. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Susannah Malarkey, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE TECHNOLOGY ALLIANCE OF WASHINGTON and MalPina Chan, ARTIST.

The form of the square frame suggests strength and solidity making it an appropriate metaphor for Susannah. From the first few moments of our initial conversation, we felt a connection as we shared memories about our mothers and daughters. Susannah’s feelings on “wise women who came before passing on and sharing their life’s lessons” and the notion of “tribal memories” serves as the inspiration for this piece.

The Encrypted Future

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

PHYLLIS CAMBPBELL, PRESIDENT AND CEO OF THE SEATTLE FOUNDATION

Right angles are only made by human beings. And if one thinks of the ultimate object created, one is led to the computer and its binary innards.

The dots on the unpainted, rectangular box are like the zeroes and ones used to create software. The disks represent programs which have strategies for solving problems of all dimensions, from local to global levels.

The box is about hope in the computer, that it will be able to help humanity.

 

 

My Kiln

Pyrometric cones play an important role in the process of making my ceramic sculpture. Although there are sophisticated instruments to measure temperature in a kiln, the cones are a more reliable indicator of the effect of TIME and HEAT on ceramic materials. The simple cone-shaped forms, each calibrated to melt at a specific temperature, can be observed through a peephole in the kiln door during a firing. As the cones bend, their reaction to the advancing temperature indicates how my sculpture is reacting.

My box represents my kiln, surrounded by previously fired “cone-pats”. It is mounted on a porcelain doily that symbolizes the interaction between my life as an artist and my rich, full domestic life.

Tomiko Fraser Revealed

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

TOMIKO FRASER, MAYBELLINE SPOKESPERSON/ACTRESS

Tomiko Fraser has benefitted greatly in her life from mentoring and, in return, wishes to nurture and empower other women. An exuberant, playful woman, she has been able to find her way and break free of the confines of others’ expectations.

In appreciation of Faith Ringgold and her painted story quilt “Sunflower Quilting Bee of Arles” (1991) and the women depicted within.

 

A Falcon or a Great Song

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

LEASA MAYERS, PRESIDENT, CRG EVENTS

In talking to Leasa Mayers about her life – her family, and her work promoting others in their ventures, the powerful Rainer Maria Rilke poem, “Growing Orbits” came to mind. It inspired me to transform the plain wooden box into a cradle holding a bird’s nest with eggs to honor Leasa’s endeavors; her creative spirit, her effective nurturing which helps others to take flight.

 

Threading Water

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

JANET LEAHY, EXECUTIVE PRODUCER OF “BOSTON LEGAL” TELEVISION SHOW

1 small wooden box

5 Peruvian worry dolls

1 drill

800 holes

1 can black spray paint

countless threads

1 very small crochet hook

one artist

one executive television producer

one collaboration

one phone call

many many emails

one new friendship

Threading Water honors women, mothers, daughters, friends, workers, wives who feel pulled in all directions while trying to stay afloat.

 

Yoriko

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

YORIKO KISHIMOTO, VICE MAYOR, CITY OF PALO ALTO and Jen Schachter, ARTIST.

A photo of Yoriko as a small child with her parents and older brother in Shizuoka, Japan flies from the branch of one of her favorite trees, the maple, signifying her love of gardens. The trail reflects her journey from Japan and her love of travel while the mountain symbolizes her love of hiking and mountains, and her desire to “climb to a high place and see as far as I can”— hence the binoculars.

The central image is her interest in the 4 elements — earth, air, fire and water. Earth is symbolized by a clay container I made (I am a potter) and the water by blue glass that was melted in the clay container.

There are so many aspects of Yoriko’s life that are not included, but through some mysterious mental process, I have focused on these ideas and presented them in this way.
 

Nancy’s Hope

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

NANCY SODERBERG, FORMER SENIOR FOREIGN POLICY ADVISOR TO CLINTON, FORMER US AMBASSADOR TO THE UNITED NATIONS

My impression of Nancy is a study in contrasts: powerful authority figure/pretty, blonde hair, soft features. Woman, wife, stepmother/facing the horror of war on a daily basis.

But a singular vision: the world can change, war can be contained.

So, we have a soft, hand-stitched pillow – symbol of domesticity, a womanly art. In the colors of the UN flag, the ultimate multilateral institution, and round, like the diplomatic Round Table. A locked, but fragile glass box, its contents a weapon of powerful but intimate destruction: an M67 Fragmentation hand grenade. And the key tucked safely away in a pocket of the UN pillow.

Laurie Dolan

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Laurie Dolan, DIRECTOR OF WASHINGTON STATE GOVERNOR’S EXECUTIVE POLICY OFFICER

Because Laurie had twice run and lost close State Senate races, my first impulse for this project was to create political art that is stark and confrontational in the style of outsider Bible-literalists — using red, black, white, block letters and simple but expressive figures.

Laurie is genuinely engaged in and faithful to the political process, seeing herself as glue, as a relationship builder. Laurie underwent a successful stem cell transplant in July 2003, and her illness and recovery impressed on her how little time we have to touch the world, and how important it is to touch our children. The text on the box runs together and reflects the impact of Laurie’s illness on her life, her desire to touch the world, and the importance of her family.

 

Energy of Thought, Word and Deed

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Rita Ryder, PRESIDENT OF STRATEGIC INITIATIVES, YWCA

Our sculpture represents the day-to-day work of the YWCA, providing hope and opportunity to women and families. Our ceramic hands represent our entire, diverse community joining together to help women and families overcome critical issues that undermine their lives: homelessness, poverty, domestic violence and unemployment.

Working together, we move women and families forward—breaking the cycle of poverty and hopelessness, and improving the quality of their lives.

What it Takes to Make Change: Sharifa Wilson and Transforming a City

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Sharifa Wilson, FORMER MAYOR OF EAST PALO ALTO; COLLEGE TRACK DIRECTOR and Daisy Juliana Eneix, ARTIST

When I first spoke with Sharifa, the former Mayor of East Palo Alto, I was struck by her absolute faith in her ability to make change. “I consider myself an optimist” citing her family as her primary inspiration. As Sharifa went on to discuss the strategies she has used to bring money, businesses, jobs and better education opportunities into East Palo Alto, it became clear that persistence was something she didn’t think twice about.

While considering what I could do for an artwork about Sharifa, I thought about what a formidable force she was. A picture came to mind of some unsuspecting guy delivering her the “Sorry lady, that’s the way it is” line and what she would do with that. This artwork is about the refusal to accept that answer and the possibilities it opens.

 

Untitled

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Elizabeth Rice-Grossman, BUSINESSWOMAN AND PHILANTHROPIST, SUPPORTER TO THE CIRCLE OF CARE FOUNDATION and Catie O’Leary, ARTIST

Images used in these collages represent Elizabeth Rice-Grossman — her life, influences and concerns, benefitting those near her home in Ventura County.

Images are personal symbols meant to represent her life, such as:

San Francisco – map, horses

New York – stock market

Hawaii – orchids

Theater – Arts for Kids, Nutcracker

African American authors

Grossman Burn Center

Migrant farmer housing

Americare – senior care

Memory TV – Circle of Care

The past enables the present

Pam’s Tear Box

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Pam Praeger, VICE PRESIDENT OF LEARNING, SPOKANE FALLS COMMUNITY COLLEGE

One of the first things that Pam said to me was, “I don’t know if anyone mentioned it to you but I lost my daughter in May and I’m still struggling with the loss.” She said it almost apologetically. As I got to know Pam it became clear that Tara, the lost daughter, set a high bar for her mother through the lessons she taught the whole family during her dying. I also learned that Pam and Tara are a lot alike. Even in pain Pam’s first impulse was to help me. I knew instinctively that it was also what Tara would have done. I am grateful to Pam and Tara for their generosity and honesty. During our time together Pam cried more than once and each time she seemed at a loss about what to do with her tears. So I’ve made a Magic box for those tears. Its capacity is endless.

Pandora a Broken Myth

In doing this box I decided to see what the original myth of Pandora was. I was struck with the beauty and the imagery of Hesiod. I laughed at the obvious fear and envy that men have had at the creative female. I felt we could look at this myth and break it open and show women in all her creative force without fear or envy.

“as a favor to Zeus the father,
On this had been done much intricate work,
a wonder to look at:
wild animals, such as the mainland
and the sea also produce
in numbers, and he put many on,
the imitations of living
things that have voices, wonderful,
and it flashed in its beauty.
But when, to replace good,
he made this beautiful evil
thing, he led her out
where the rest of the gods and mortals
were, in the pride and glory
that the gray-eyed daughter of a great
father had given; wonder seized both immortals and mortals
as they gazed on this sheer deception.”

Hesiod translated by Richmond Lattimore

Love

Teen Box. Culver City Highschool. Grade 11.

My box was based on the book of I Corinthians 13 in the Bible. Love is not something that is jealous, boastful, and impatient. I used the last verse:

“And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love.” But the greatest of these is love. The box represents love itself, with in it are the mustard seeds which represent faith because God said “if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you could move mountains.” The stars represent hope. The leaves in front of the box symbolize the growth of love, that it never stops getting better.

Fabricated Fame

Today’s celebrities seem to all be coming out of some celebrity machine.  Behind the glitz and glam, the expensive cars and fancy clothes, are producers and stylists that give celebrities their identities.  They all strive for the ideal image but in the process they become copies of each other.  I made my box into a gaudy, sparkly representation of fame.  I’ve carved in idealistic image of a figure into the lid of the box and created prints from it.  The prints show how celebrities are simply produced copies that are made to be this ideal.

 

How To

I collect “how to” illustrations, the drawings that come on packages that show you how to use the product. For this box, I made three scrolls with my copies of those illustrations.  I used instructional drawings from health books, dental floss, box cutters, screwdrivers,chopsticks and Hi-8 tapes.  They are packed tightly inside the box, a representation of the jumble of rules.

A Mother’s Treasure

A Mother’s Treasure was created to depict an experience that women share in common– the love and nurturing of our children.  The symbol that came to my mind was baby teeth.  Every child in every culture sheds its first teeth, and everywhere mothers soothe and celebrate this rite of passage from babyhood to childhood.  Just as my two sons grew up and moved into their own adult lives, I give up my treasure  –  their saved baby teeth  –  to make a rattle to distract and amuse other babies in other places. Loving greetings to all the mothers and their young.

 

Outside the Box

To know who I am is the quest.
To learn lessons is the school of life
To see emotion as the road least traveled.
To find the path past mind is the road to the soul.
To see life as a continuously unfolding process
To live life to the fullest is to live in the present.
To open to humaness is to see life’s treasures
To live in the present is going outside of the box.

From: If Life is a Game, these are the Rules
The Rules for Being Human
Dr. Chérie Carter-Scott

 

Welcome to La La Land

Culver City Highschool. Grade 11.

My box represents my life and being a high school student in a modern world, which is all crazy. I titled this piece Welcome To La La Land because my nickname is Lala and I wanted to show a glimpse of my life. Well, what I wanted to say about myself was that, I am a quiet person but inside I am crazy, confused and talkative, but I keep it locked inside most of the time. Inside, I put little things that represent me and keys, which is the thing that will open the box (myself). I see finding the keys is like finding you, the key that will open you to the world. I have little things that can’t remain in the box like my creativity, self-expression and friendship. I feel that most people are like me and until you find yourself, you can’t find the key that will help you open up and allow you to be more yourself.

The monarch trapped in their expectations, reducing the imperial ruler into a mere puppet controlled by golden strings.

Reverberation: Yuri Kochiyama

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Yuri Kochiyama, LEGENDARY CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVIST; CLOSE FRIEND AND ASSOCIATE OF MALCOM X and June Sekiguchi, ARTIST.

I want to represent the effect pivotal events had on Yuri Kochiyama and how her life and work had a ripple effect in turn. Something breaks the surface of awareness and affects a resounding change. The box is the foundation supporting barbed wire which acts not only as the internal framework of concentric ripples reverberating beyond the source, but references important aspects of Yuri’s life: internment and political prisoners.

The box holds a gathering of pebbles that signify the catalyst of change. The ripples are inscribed with quotes, influences, and documentation of her life. I’ve chosen to use text heavily in this piece because the written word has held a place of importance in Yuri’s connection to the world. Light and shadow reflect the intangible far reaching affect she has had.

The Women’s World

Mother Earth

Deep within her there is life.
She is encircled by the web of life.
It is no mistake that earth is a “she”
for all that grows does so because of her.
We are the children of this mother.
We are all connected to the earth and one another
through this mystical experience we call life.

Washed Up

Culver City High School. Grade 12.

Through the open seas
Now I am being driven
By an old rusty ship
The winds beat down on the deck
And the sails are always slipping in my hands
To the places I want to go
And there where I shouldn’t go,
But the ocean has chosen the way.

Journey #17

Vietnamese / American Boxes

This box, a part of the Journey Series, combines elements as diverse as Egyptian funeral boats, Vietnamese river craft and streamline airplanes. Each piece explores the religious and spiritual significance of journeys through the symbol of the vessel. After my own experience of fleeing Vietnam in 1975, the vessel represents memories of hardship and hope.

Radical Profiling

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Joan Takayama-Ogawa (artist) and Elaine Tajima (CEO, founder at Tajima Creative)

We live in times of war, where racial profiling threatens the freedom of Arab Americans. By transforming this wooden box into a shrine representing my family’s internment in Japanese American relocation camps, I hope that racial profiling will not happen again.

Symbols of the highest decorated American 442 Regimental Combat Unit, the luggage tags with family numbers for the Takayama and Ogawas, rotate around the box symbolically, tied with barbed wire. Along the perimeter of the black tray, a plant revered by Japanese Americans, connects with barbed wire symbolizing their incarceration. A gold crane perched on a post, represents the Hiroshima bomb.

Thirty-seven last names along the edge of the tray represent hundreds of my family members who were incarcerated during World War II, remembering freedom is fragile, and racial profiling is intolerable.

 

Living Out of the Box (As a Survivor)

Tajima. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box. 

Beverlye Hyman Fead, CANCER SURVIVOR and Rita Rivest, ARTIST

The theme of my box is how much happier I am today — living out of the box. For half my life, I lived within the confines of the box and when I realized I was dying inside, I moved on.

Inside the bottom of the box are names of women I admire that have chosen unusual roads for themselves. They inspired me to move away from everything I knew and start over. When I became a cancer survivor, it was then I realized I had been a survivor of sorts all my life and now I could start inspiring others.

I wrote a book and have decoupaged pieces of my book on and inside my box. My banners of survivorship and living my life in my own way, wave triumphantly from the box spurring me on. I hope they will have the same effect on any woman, young or old, who will see this box.

Rita Rivest, my friend and soul sister, has been my mentor and my muse in this project. Thank you, Rita.

In Memory of My Father

This box turned out to be about the death of my father (1925-1986). In thinking about the exhibition and before I actually had the box in my hands I thought of “hope chests” and “Pandora’s box,” both representing women’s issues and lives. But behind these thoughts was always the image of coffins and bone boxes (the boxes that the bones of the dead in Greece are transferred into after their initial burial).

After receiving the box and playing around with it for awhile, I had to go with the more direct, personal association of my father’s death. So it became a shrine, a memento mori, a symbolic object. The words on top are FUTURE, PLACE, GOOD MAN, LIES. The words inside of the half-open box are HERA, MOTHER, THERAPY, FATHER, DREAM, STRANGER. We will all go to this future place. Here, a good man, lies. Hera, Greek goddess, wife of Zeus, mother/father/therapy, dream, father stranger.

Dreams of Dancing

Idee Levitan, an artist and patron of the arts, world traveler, lifelong philosophy student, adventure seeker, mountain climber, wife, friend, and proud member of a most independent sisterhood of polio survivors, died before she had the opportunity to work on the Women Beyond Borders project.  The virgin box was among the mementos Idee’s husband sent to me.  My dearest soulmate, Elena Mary Siff, invited me to create a tribute to Idee’s spirit so that Idee might be a part of an intriguing and profound exhibition she would have heartily embraced.  The Wheel Chair could not contain her Dreams of Dancing…

 

Shoe Box

Shoes are also an important artistic expression for me. You see, as a walker, shoes are to me what cars are for others. They transport us from where we are to where we want to be.

The first box in my Women beyond borders series, represented women as guardians of the treasure within. “The Guardians R Us” 1996.

Now, the third box in my series releases part of its contents. The missing shoe mate and box top travel to Europe, entitled “Left Shoe Looking For Right” 1999.

Additional boxes by same artist

Song Heartfelt

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

Nita Song, PRESIDENT/COO OF IW GROUP, ASIAN AMERICAN ADVERTISING AGENCY and Ann Enkoji, ARTIST

The starting point of this sculpture began when I asked Nita about pivotal moments in her life and she began to share the stories that created the themes for the box:

— moving with her family to the US to live in Alabama with her aunt
— pinching a young playmate until he broke her nose with a brick
— taking that injury and wearing it as an emblem of her character
— delivering her first child, weighing in at 10 pounds
— her two children’s artwork
— deepening her family and community relationships, especially with her mother
— and her love of the soil

Clay became the natural connection between my art and Nita’s life when she said: “… soil represents who I am. Soil is fertile, nutrient rich and stimulates growth.”

Emerge: Each Holy Remain

This book/box was produced for the 1999 leg of the Women Beyond Borders show.  Its surfaces covered with gesso (support for intricate graphite drawings) and gold leaf, includes a reliquary indicating potential life, death, and  emergence into light. The 52-page book pictures detritus from daily living, preserved by attentive drawing and watercolor: seeds, bones, plant tips, shells, buds, nuts, skeletons.

I know that there are lives much tougher than my own, and that I am enormously privileged to luxuriate in the poignant beauty of the commonplace. I hope that we all sometimes have the opportunity to pause and consider, even in the helpless despair of suffering and the frustrating reality of working so hard so often for our own survival; physical, spiritual, intellectual and emotional, and that of our loved ones, as well as all sentient beings.

Dragon Box

Using the box as a metaphor for prescribed limitations in one’s life, this box is not a place of confinement. The edges have softened and fallen open, allowing the light to radiate from a life force of an egg. From the light comes new freedom and love. The inside of the box reflects the light so that the power is magnified, thus illuminating the path towards release.

 

Seyburn Zorthian – Open Box

Balkan Dance

This traditional Balkan folk dance slipper carries a box holding the grief and terror of deportation and internment as well as hope for endurance and the end of all exiles- physical, political, cultural and spiritual.

Bearing One Another’s Burdens

As I contemplated my involvement in this project I was immediately drawn to the reverent simplicity of the tiny redwood box.  As I held the box and pondered its humble strength and quiet stability I was instantly reminded of the strength, perseverance and poise-under-pressure that often signifies women in general.  This strength of endurance caused me to then think of the many burdens we all carry around with us, and how much lighter the burden can be when we know someone is helping to carry the load.  The Bible reminds us to share in each other’s trials.  By helping to bear the load brought on by death, illness, heartbreak, loneliness or other oppressions, we offer comfort and hope.

In creating this visual testimony I attached the lid to the box and produced a stable and strong vessel.  The vessel houses the strength, perseverance and love that together can lift, carry and support the great weight of the burden that is placed upon it.  The burden, a complex aggregate rock, is both rugged and smooth in its makeup.  Beneath the rock is a cushion, a sheet of gold, intended to soften the burden.  The rock is bound to the box with a tightly wrapped and intertwined cord.  The cord is the weakest element.  It can be cut, and at any time the burden can be lifted.  The cord reminds us of our obligation.

It is my intent that this box stand as a reminder to all of us to humbly bear one another’s burdens, to encourage and strengthen one another, to love, honor and pray for one another.  By helping to bear the burdens, we find joy in knowing that we have contributed to the needs of others.  By bearing one another’s burdens there are blessings to be found in the midst of tribulation; there are victories to be found in hidden places.

Lost Butterflies

Where have all the mothers gone?
Off like butterflies in the wind.
All to great deeds of glory
Then on to new beginnings again.
The chrysalis of life is a never ending bond
Until the end of time.
Where have all the mothers gone?
Lost the most precious gift, a child of mine.

 

Outside In

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box.

KATE MCISAAC ,1ST LIEUTENANT, U.S. ARMY and Laura Klein, ARTIST

Kate McIsaac just celebrated her 30th birthday in Baqubah, Iraq. She is a 1st Lieutenant in the Army, serving in OIF IV – V at FOB Warhorse as a postal officer. Her unit is from Long Beach, California.

She is also a first-year law student at Whittier Law School in Costa Mesa and will either go into criminal law or First Amendment Libel law. Libel law is near and dear to her heart.

Kate also has a degree in Journalism and worked as a journalist for several years.

 

Skin Deep

Spilling out of a Pandora’s box, previously concealed truths reveal themselves. A hand, a living experience and the intuition it contains, is full of signification. This can be translated in a multiplicity of paradoxical ways.

Beauty is a socioeconomic and political construction. How we depict women in art opens up a dialogue and an opportunity to affect our inter-relationships. We are not alone in deriving pleasure from the spectacle.  Manet’s Olympia, and the official ideology she implies, returns our gaze.

 

Biological Baby Buggy

With my work I explore the theme of a woman’s fertility.  Fertility is a complex issue and fertility is not always a G-d given right.  Age and circumstances can exert enormous pressure on women to define themselves, to reach important decisions at what could be an inopportune time.

To embrace motherhood or to reject motherhood, or to gain motherhood through extreme and unusual means: are all fraught with their own assumptions and characterizations, either internally innate or imposed by external forces.

The tendency to define a woman by her ability to bear children is limiting and demeaning.  A woman must be defined by her ability to live a positive and meaningful life.

My quest is to honor all women who engage in creation whatever form it might take and encourage women to feel comfort and acceptance on many paths.

Voice Box

Voice Box is a reminder of the fertile, nurturing potential of women’s words and the pain that women endure in trying to speak those messages. It contains powdered milk and an egg licked by tongues of flame and so marked with soot.

materials: wood, powdered milk, soot, paint, paper.

Slick Chick – A Balancing Act

Age takes slick and chick
But eggs so perfect go on
And on
To feed the fragile Universe
And return and recharge and provide
Time and time anew
The best nests everywhere.
Beyond borders
Or difference we nurture
And yet strut our stuff.
No dumb clucks- we chicks!
You know…we have something worth crowing about…

 

Revelation

“To laugh often
and much, to win
the respect of
intelligent people
and the affection
of children, to earn
the appreciation
of honest critics
and endure the
betrayal of false
friends, to
appreciate beauty,
to find the best
in others,

to leave the world
a bit better, whether
by a healthy child,
a garden patch…
to know even one
life has breathed
easier because
you have lived.
This is to have
succeeded!”

-Emerson

Welcome to the Forest of Dreams

I have built a place of healing and repose.
Though small enough to fit in your hand,
it is a place to soothe and comfort the weary sojourner.
May you enter and find your peace.

Enter the forest, its cool green breath,
its embracing boughs, its mystery.
Enter the shadows your spirit longs for,
follow the labyrinth.
Enter the heart of the ancient forest,
wander until the dusk surrounds you.
until you find you have come to a place of rest.
Dream until you have found contentment.
Dream until you have found your own way
home, into the light.

Self Portrait #2

My work is a personal investigation which began as an attempt to see the body through the photographic medium in ways which are impossible with the naked eye.

I realize that we view images of the body very differently when they are life size or larger. Other objects do not hold such power and are always subject to interpretation of space when confronted by differences in size. The body, although conforming to the same rules of perspective, also holds another set of rules. The body is the common denominator of all the viewers, it is something to relate with on the most personal and intimate basis.

When working in photography it is important to remember that, unfortunately, photography is the choice medium of pornographers. It is a transparent medium; one that is taken of evidence of objective truth with little subjective interdiction. Any picture of a body is not necessarily thought of as a picture of a body, but as a body. We see through the portal of the pictures medium and look at the picture as evidence of truth…or of the body itself. A painting of a body has a different emotional charge than a photograph of the same body. Where a painting of the body would be considered sensual, a photograph of the same body is considered pornographic.

I am dealing with the total involvement of the figure and the role and relationship of the artist and viewer.

 

No Chains on My Feet

Inspired by Bob Marley’s concrete jungle. My box signifies the reality of life. Nobody is really free. There are restrictions, expectations, and guidelines on you, which don’t allow you to be free. People are fed lots of lies, been told things that sound good, just to keep them satisfied, but if you stop and really think your chains may be invisible, yet they’re present. You are never really free to be yourself. Life is captivity. The baby inside the box shows that the moment your life starts is the same point your freedom dies.

Think Local, Act Local

Santa Barbara focuses within its boundaries by caring for its people and environment, which causes a domino effect. The effect touches locally, but also worldwide. Santa Barbara is a jewel by the sea. Fishing is an integral part of the local economy. The sailing vessel made out the box exemplifies our location and the many wonderful sights and sounds that await tourists who touch our shores.

We “locals” touch the world community by our friendly hospitality and we offer tourists numerous and varied experiences to understand the American lifestyle. We care for ourselves, therefore we care for and respect others in all parts of the world. We have many organizations that support world-wide causes, such as Direct Relief International and Jean Michael Cousteau’s Heal the Ocean. We are seeking ways to maintain a homogenous community to assimilate all walks of life and when anyone encounters our beautiful city, he or she may also “think local and act local”.

Overflowing

As the world’s population increases at alarming rates, heavy human consumption is producing drastic amounts of waste and garbage. Landfills are overflowing and space for containing our trash is limited. This box represents Earth’s limited available space for containing our waste. By recycling, we can collectively help to prolong the Earth’s beautiful and natural elements.

We’re All in this Boat Together

I work with containers because they make me happy. Each piece I create becomes a container of conscious and unconscious thoughts and feelings: a nest, a womb, a secret, a surprise or a giggle. And always, a feeling of being in touch with my female ancestral beginnings.

My containers contain “me”. Being a wife, mother and “Nana” have been the most important things in my life. My baskets honor and celebrate the family. I use words and images of women and children because I want my basket/vessel to have content…to say something. I want to validate the importance of the family and the values and morals it nurtures. My vessels are autobiographical and are the scrapbooks of my life.

Throughout history women have found creative time in their lives to make baskets. Knotless netting, the technique I use to cover the gourds and molded forms, is an ancient, tedious, continuous thread technique that is used for nets, baskets and button holes and is symbolic of women’s work in the home.

 

Altar for Eve’s Chromosomes

Eve represents the first woman. I am honoring her genetic material with this mixed media sculpture. All women have descended from Eve’s chromosomes, which are the most fundamental, significant and potentially eternal part of our experience as humans.

Artistically, this work is related to a series of white wood wall sculptures I made during the late 1980’s. The objects I have added to the original box materials are symbolically related to women’s genetic and cultural heritage.

 

Mom, Me, and the Pink Dancers

This work has to do with the cycle of life and where I am in that cycle now. It is a combination of fears–past and present, traumatic experiences—past and present, hopes, dreams, pain and frustration that continue, that I am more or less resigned to endure. It is to honor my mother and her teaching and love for me, my love for her and what each generation of women pass to one another.

The pink dancers were an image I formed from an interview I heard on public radio with young women activists who dress in pink and perform on the sidewalk of urban centers to attract people to engage them in discussions pertaining to social and political issues of the progressive left. I yearned and regretted for a moment that I was not there, was not a pink dancer. But soon saw that they were the next phase, and was glad just that they were there. Yes! to them.

War is still bad, starving children are still bad, and women still have to keep working to stop these things from happening. There is a lot of pain we must carry with us.

My own children (17yrs old & 21yrs old) saw this piece being made. The red stuffing, I told my questioning son, represented blood and tissue. However, it was not bad. Blood is everywhere when you are born. It is a good thing. Blood is life.

Such a small piece, so much to say. Very personal.

Sparkle of Life

Coca-Cola Box Project.

Many years ago after a long and hot morning of doing house chores, my exhausted and thirsty mother would unexpectedly rush through the door. Intrigued, I would rapidly tie my worn out shoes and head to the kitchen. There holding a bottle, as if it were the last one left in the world, was my mom. As she drank it, a smile would slowly illuminate her face. Noticing my curiosity, she pointed at the bottle and said, “This is the sparkle of life.”

In a convulsive world of dispute over territory, religion and culture, men and women face a daily struggle searching for solutions to make this planet a better one for everybody. What has for many years been missing however, is the perspective of the real sparkle of life: The Woman. Just as Coca-Cola illuminated my mother’s eyes, this world would benefit greatly by considering more seriously the ideas and propositions of the woman. So, the purpose of this project was simply to portray and honor the woman not only as the sparkle of life but as the queen of the universe.

 

Ripened Fruit

“This world is a tree to which we cling–
we, the half-ripe fruit upon it.
The immature fruit clings tight to the branch
because, not yet ripe, it’s unfit for the palace.
When fruits become ripe, sweet, and juicy,
then, biting their lips, they loosen their hold.
When the mouth has been sweetened by felicity,
the kingdom of the world loses its appeal.
To be tightly attached to the world is immaturity;
as long as you’re an embryo,
blood-sipping is your interest.”

– Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi

A fascination with seeds, seed pods, fruit of both tree and vine accompanied my own struggle with fertility. What appeared to be fallow in my life gradually evolved into a period of regeneration and rebirth. At present, these familiar forms reflect the renewal of my work and symbolize the opaque and marvelous mystery of the human life.

This box is lovingly dedicated to Mary Interlandi: May 20, 1983 – February 10, 2003

Nurture

We take care of things that are important to us. The females of most species are considered to be nurturers and keepers of the “nest”.

Being and artist has allowed me the opportunity to nurture the things that are most important to me – represented by the golden eggs in the nest of brushes. I care about many things and to limit myself to representing just four became a daunting task – I thought about Peace, Love, Compassion and Creativity, but upon reflection each day, the list grew. How could I not mention family, good health, rich soil and clean water, friendships and the miracle of simply being whole?

So without putting words to the golden eggs, I’ll leave it for those who view the art to ponder…How and what will you “nurture” in your life? We must take care of what is most precious to us.

Spill It, A Veil of Truth

Coca-Cola Box Project.

The idea for our box originated from a website that the Coca-Cola company published called Spill It. Contained within the site were thousands of messages by people all around the world who just wanted to spill their minds and share with others. The box, covered with small pieces of aluminum Coca-Cola cans found in trash cans around the campus, is overflowing with little scrolls of personalized messages from whoever wanted to contribute.

Keep It Burning

matches played with in our youth
we were going to set the world on fire
maybe still
maybe again
keep it burning.

lighted candles, take a breath
don’t blow them out
inner glow, light, fire, magic
keep it burning.

grow with the flame; feel its warmth
light the passion
dance with the fire
keep it burning
keep it burning!

Medium: wood, metal

Remnants

Remnants references my many, may years as a working artist, particularly as a printmaker. I selected remnants from 30 years of art-making into the contained box, making my own sort of small “retrospective”. Working on this piece brought up a wide spectrum of memories, thoughts and emotions – and the toil and labor that go into a work of art. I consider myself a very fortunate person.

Coca-Cola Wind Chime

Coca-Cola Box Project.

As a child actor, Kelsey was in an ad for Coca-Cola when she was ten years old. The set was designed to look like a tree house. Kelsey was dressed as a tomboy and just wanted to hang out with the boys who were sitting around a table in the tree house drinking glass bottles of Coca-Cola. With longing, Kelsey was pictured peeking at the boys as they enjoyed Coca-Cola.

Celebration

My box is a celebration of the joy of life, magic and imagination. I used the red part of the cardboard and some of the words found on the carton the words joy and oz., referring to the Wizard of Oz, and Coke. I cut the cardboard in the manner of Matisse with shapes of women dancing.

I teach eight art classes at four different colleges, sixty hours a week including driving time. Needless to say, I have little time to stop for a meal. So when my blood sugar starts to drop, I have a Coke. There is nothing like it–the two major food groups of sugar and caffeine. Coca Cola gives me a lift and makes me feel good.

 

Granfaloon of 3

I adored my maternal grandmother and gave my daughter her name. Isabella. One day when my daughter was a tiny girl, she said to me, out of the blue, “Remember when I was the big lady and you were the little girl? Wasn’t  that fun?” It was fun.

Indra’s Net

“In the heaven of Indra, there is said to be a network of pearls so arranged that if you look at one you see all the others reflected in it. In the same way each object in the world is not merely itself but involves every other object and in fact is everything else.”

– Translated by Sir Charles Eliot from the Avatamsaka Sutra, approximately 500 BCE

Lorraine Serena furnished the box
Julie Coale suggested these pearls
Sylvia Hyman recommended Sherry Male for drilling them
Tyree McFarland provided the silvered glass and the glasswork
Daisy gave me the idea for suturing thread
Dr. Dee Dee Fredin supplied it
Dixie Gamble manifested the replacement glass
and Jane Braddock buttoned it up
women’s network.

My Grandmother

Coca-Cola Box Project.

As long as I can remember my grandmother in Mexico always bought seven bottles of Coca-Cola a week. She has one bottle a day: a few ounces in the morning mixed with two raw eggs; a few ounces with lunch; and the rest with her dinner. She never drinks water at all, just the Coke. She is ninety-two years old.

 

An American Girl

Is there no greater suffering than “An American Girl, Shopping For A Husband”? In her single days, she would cry and cry over lost loves, covet the sacred purchases of keepsakes in hope for love, and dream endlessly for the one– a final purchase of the dream guy and live happily ever after.

Medium: The box, Ukranian egg dyes, silver and gold spray paint, floral wire, embroidery thread, wood ball, buttons and dominos, netting, yarn, plastic shopping bags, things girls buy, one groomsman cut in half, newspaper clipping, wire, crotchet needle, Modge Podge and Tacky glue.

Watersheds

Coca-Cola Box Project

We were intrigued by the boundary aspect of this Women beyond borders box project. Our thoughts turned to physical boundaries, specifically those found in Santa Barbara. By looking at a map, you can see the natural boundaries that are created by watersheds in our area. A watershed is an elevation, a divide, a drainage basin that separates one river system from another, and ultimately drains to a watercourse or body of water. Defining Santa Barbara by its watersheds would change our existing boundaries.

At this point in time, watershed education is important. There are vital connections between our watershed resources, human activity and water quality. Watershed restoration improves water quality, creeks, wetlands and the ocean.

Fannie’s Soap Box: The Story of an American Cheerleader

Tajima Box Project. An artist and an extraordinary woman collaborate to create a box. 

Fannie Flagg, ACTRESS, COMEDIAN, AND AUTHOR with Ramona Otto, ARTIST.

When I was told that I would be doing a piece on Fannie Flagg, I was honored. We are from the same generation, and I’ve always enjoyed her TV and film work, and was impressed that she was also a brilliant author and screenwriter. Because word play is often a part of my work, my original thought was to make the box into a soapbox, and then I could make the theme into whatever message was important to Fannie.

Fannie’s wish was to have a positive art piece because she was tired of all the negative art and energy being released into the world. She hoped her piece could reflect that life was good.

I hope my title gives a whole new meaning to the word “cheerleader.”

 

 

Conflict

Like most domestic tools, the straight pin is usually considered a useful and innocuous object. I use thousands of them to make aggressive statements referencing handwork, domesticity and the female voice. The finished pieces are beautiful. They are also sharp and dangerous. Like the tiny pins that efficiently perform multiple household tasks, my work suggests more than what meets the eye. “Conflict” physically expresses endured emotional battles.

With my background in fiber art from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, I am intrigued by the works of George Segal, Edward and Nancy Kienholz, Cathy de Moncheaux, Annette Message, Louise Nevelson, Eva Heese and Ann Hamilton. Finally, the following excerpt, as read not in context, but taken from Anais Nin’s A Spy in the House of Love, 1968, pp. 6-7, sheds light on my ideological treatment of perception.

“She was like an actress who must compose a face, an attitude to meet the day…She must redesign the face, smooth the anxious brows, separate the crushed eyelashes, wash off the traces of secret, interior tears, accentuate the mouth as upon a canvas, so it will hold its luxuriant smile. Inner chaos, like those secret volcanoes which suddenly lift the neat furrows of a peacefully plowed field, awaited behind all disorders of face, hair and costume, for a fissure through which to explode.”

Who am I?

As a growing teenager, I often find it hard to determine who I am as an individual. I used the box as an icon of my self-being. I feel as a teenager we often take life for granted and forget how every decision we make is an important one. The stilts on the box are there to exaggerate how important the choices you make in life are. The shattered pieces of glass, directed toward the box, show the constant pressures in life. I chose mirror to show that by just looking in the mirror at yourself you think about who you are. The box is placed upside down to show how I have built my own shelter, apart from my family to protect myself in this world.