The Well Below the Valley
Young women who suffered societal injustice under the shroud of organized religion inspire this series of artwork. I specifically considered the Magdalene Laundries that operated from 1880 to 1996 in Dublin Ireland. This facility forcefully housed and “employed” women who were unchaste, consensual or otherwise. Their incarceration was designed to cannibalize ones worth, individuality and sexuality. “The Well Below the Valley” investigates the threads of sexual truth women historically share. I chose to use a primitive representation of a bed in my imagery – barracks style. The diptych format severs the bed from itself as well as from the other beds. The bed symbolizes our stark, mortal and vulnerable condition. “Bed” equals universality. We are more often than not conceived upon, born within and will die upon a bed. Many women have been violated to one degree or another upon one. It is both sacred and merciless. My crude imagery of the bed, encased in black, suggests the binding of primitive physio-emotive memory. This series is macabre yet it also establishes women’s tenacity toward survival and power.