storied

As a viewer brings themselves to a painting, so the reader brings themselves to a book. I have loved to read since I can remember, second only to making art. With the rampant rise of book banning and censorship in the United States, I knew I wanted to respond in a visual way to this dangerous trend.

Because I often incorporate text into my work, I knew I would include pieces of the books themselves. But which book? It needed to be something with particular resonance to me. I chose Beloved by Toni Morrison because this was a story I had read multiple times, because it is one of the most banned books in the U.S.* and because the text has stayed with me past my initial reading.

Upon deciding to use Beloved, I dug out my copy from college to read yet again. It was enlightening to find all my notes and underlines; question marks I had in places and little tags to help me find a particular passage. While the paper I wrote is long gone, it was fascinating to have a glimpse into my past. What I found notable then was not always what I found notable now.

To add my voice to the story, I have included parts of my own journals from college, when I first encountered Beloved and was grappling with what it meant to be an artist, a feminist, a woman of color.

A book can be a story itself, a story about the reader, or a story about the times. Like a multi-storied building, a book can have many meanings. Exploring these meanings was my goal for this series.

* American Library Association: https://www.ala.org/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/decade2019