Fluent collaborative, it might be good, interview

Interview with Claire Ruud
The interview :: Kathryn Kelley/Claire Ruud

Austin Statesman Art ReviewHouston artist fashions domesticity from urban refuse

"Nothing screams 'Home Sweet Home' in Kelley's aesthetic - perhaps theatrical? - vocabulary like `As the Ache.' ...

But Kelley's home is not to be feared. Stitched and nailed and stapled together from whatever our over-consuming industrial culture has left behind, this home sweet home reads as an allegory to a new more truthful kind of personal homemaking - one that eschews the expectations of others.

From unappealing detritus, Kelley fashions a stage for a much more gnarly but ultimately more truthful kind of existence."

excerpt Austin Statesman Art Review by Jeanne Claire van Ryzin

Lunch break

How could I not go outside today. To beautiful to stay indoors. Deep
blue depth of sky, vivid green of new life. How could I not step out
into this?

treading where no one hears the echo of her foot fall Solo Exhibition @ Women and Their Work up until April 15, 2010.

kathryn kelley
Women and Their Work
1710 Lavaca Street
Austin, TX 78701-1316
march 6-april 15, 2010

each piece in the exhibition, instead of being titled, is associated with a poem written during the same approximate timeframe in which i was making the work (i write--i make; i make--i write; each is part of the process of the other)

~18' x 6' x 10' made from remnant tubes, door, frame, wood, 2010.
associated poem

when i shut up love
the door bangs closed
i pound and scrape
my fingers
bloody with prying
but without love
without hope
tightly shut it remains
i smell the void
the vacancy

the remotest parting
and i find
my lips part as they
press to the frame
to drink in the waft
that trickles through
i scribble down
as fast as can
the words that
spill over
and i reach
for the handle

~8' x 8' x 10' made from remnant tire elements, door, frame, wood, 2010.
associated poem

i breathe

i could no longer stay
self sequestered there
in the tower of my making

there is no good way to destroy
one's own tower
while remaining inside
there is no good way to get down
without help

no one came

i crumbled the tower
of my making
from within

and now
i wipe the dust from my face
and i stand in the rubble
of this crumbled tower

i see my feet are on the ground
i reach down
brush aside the rubble there
i am searching
searching for my path

i breathe and
i am grateful for that breath

yet i am so grieved
that they needed to tell me
i would be and will be destroyed
my breath catches deep within

~15' x 8' x 10' made from remnant tubes, door, frame, wood, 2010.
associated poem

as the ache
swells in me
there is a splintering
at the horizon of today
fragments of yesterday
and tomorrow

and i listen at this abyss
as the beyond beckons me
with its urgency and passion

i open my splintered self to it
and it whispers
my name

poem associated with exhibition title, treading where no one hears the echo of her foot fall, and the source text for the development of the exhibition:

Tell me the story of when fire came down and consumed two souls, two melded not in sameness but in fiery harmony, where they fit together and made a wholeness, a rightness, a space of intimate belonging, where love and partnership merged in the flame, a love so deep the aching overwhelms. Tell me the story of the unfolding of the fragments of wholeness through the vehicle of love. Tell me the story of a fire that can burn me with goodness and beauty. Tell me this story, not one of shadows; one of hope, not hardening. Let me flee the shadows that are bleak with chill and harden my soul in areas that have only yet begun to thaw. Tell me the story of love and light, the one that draws back the curtains of my soul and beckons me to the scent of dawn. Tell me the story where I can know light, where I can flow into the future fully present, one where this gentler light warms the hard places of my soul. Tell me a story of fire.

I don't want to hear the story of she who steals, who embraces the cold shadow of lie and self-deception that dance teasingly over her heart.

I don't want to hear her story of longing that goes empty, a space where she remains vacant and lost and wretches in the wilderness of her under grown soul.

I don't want to hear the story of the girl who got lost in her head with a thought, an idea, who lost all sense of presence and found herself alone in the vacuous cavern of her own mind, treading where no one hears the echoes of her footfall.

I don't want to hear the story of the girl who sacrificed herself for doing only what is right, who didn't know love because she was to afraid of doing wrong.
I only want one story; I don't want to hear the others for fear that they are me.

Blustery blue sky day with mi mom

cold day, studio sort of tidy, naturally i put my space heaters away this morning...

now i've broken them back out, curled up on my futon, turning brain off, time to revisit hensen's movie, THE DARK CRYSTAL...

my morning reading

Got stuck on just a few paragraphs. So I will ponder them for awhile. I think it will mean different things to different people. I do not know what it means to me yet but it resonates with what I sense as mercy and meaning and hope.

Thomas Keating paraphrased
Here is what I read.

It is nice to know that we are not expected to succeed the first few times we try to see god, or our way, in the midst of difficulties from within and from without. We miss the first few times or more. When we start sinking, we call for help and god seems to moderate the intensity of the trial so that we can get a brief rest and try again. The "again" for the apostles was jesus' crucifixion and they all sank. Trials always LOOK like impossible situations. We try to accept them but things get to tough. Our faith and trust wither and we begin to sink. We call for help and again god rescues. There is a brief calm. If we continue the journey, the wind and waves start up again. Again we try to find god, to find reason, in the particular difficulty; again we start to drown; he pulls us out (again and again). This is the story of everyone's spiritual journey. The only mistake is to go down and stay down; to sink and not yell for help.

Little by little we are able to hear the still small voice in the difficulty. If we can find him there, we will never lose him. Without difficulties, we would not know the power of god's mercies and the incredible destiny he has for each of us. We must be patient with our failures. There is always another opportunity unless we go ashore and stay there. A No-risk situation is the biggest danger there is. To encounter the winds and the waves is not a sign of defeat. It is a training in the art of fully living, which is the strange art of yielding to god's action and believing in his love no matter what happens.

Taken from book, Awakenings.

Sure I've embedded iPhone one thumbed typos in the typing. I know.

They're stacked and sorted by size

Now some more tidying and then it's time to make.

Goat cook off on saturdAy

I think i am in the middle of no where, USA, perhaps

Wind farms

As far as the eye can see. Beautiful.

Mecca is in Lubbock

The margins and the center

“I always feel that the margins tell you more than the center of the page ever could.” Marcia Tucker

In life and art I totally concur. So I again study my margins opening myself to be taught and refined at my center. And I see I have a habit of analyzing others margins trying to know their center. This is not such a bad thing except when I use it to judge them, find them lacking, and thus use it to faultily bolster my own worth or "better thanness." So I keep working to stop judging them by margin (or center)--I stRuggle as certain margins brush against me so coarsely.

www.kathrynkelley.blogspot.com

T-shirt yesterday and warm

Right now...I believeit'ss called sleet.???

Zoom on this pic, the white stuff = sleet.

Lubbock suppose to be hot, dry and windy. Instead it's cold and really slopey wet. But enjoying visiting my friends regardless. Tracto tube harvesting may be alittle chilly.

Turbine vs train

Massive

Wind turbines. They amaze me every time

So what am I going to do with the rest of this one wild and precious gift of life i have been given?

After the last 18 months with 5 solo shows (too many for sanity but they kept me sane), being peri-menopausal, having my t3 and t4 totally out of wack (thyroid drugs), having my marriage implode after 21 1/2 years, loosing my best friends of 17+ years, loosing some of my precious god children whom i loved since they kicked about in their mom's womb and precious family of a quarter of a century, figuring out how I am going to feed myself and provide shelter, fighting to not be put on the street penniless, securing a job that can counter this, being told what a horrendous untrustworthy harsh scary person I am by people I love, and by others told the opposite, getting as skinny as a refugee, trying to get a fledgling nonprofit art space up and running (with a wonderful team of can-do awesome artists), participating in a divorce process where we were far worse then all the people who had gone before that we had judged so harshly, having my own arrogance and judgmentalness ripped bare, having been told that my experience of faith was a lie and all that was good in me was false, digging deeper than I have ever before into what I believe and don't, having my eyes opened to my prejudices of unthought through beliefs that under girded my life, stupid arrogant ones, like Christians have the market on love and community, ethics, kindness and forgiveness, I was shown it simply isn't so, helping my dad through the transition of placing my mom in the nursing home and the deep visceral feelings of abandoning one's spouse, having my dad diagnosed with Parkinson’s, falling in love with my mom and dad in a new way, being held and kissed by my mom and patted on the head like a little girl while she cradled me in her arms, crying together with my dad, my brother and my sister In-law, being a better sister, being a better daughter, getting to see my awesome niece and nephew more, watching my aunt and uncle be so brave in fighting cancer, growing in love and respect for them both, being vulnerable and weeping deeply with my girl friends and grand girl friends, learning to ask for help, really learning that I have voice and my value is not determined by others though it feels good when I am valued by them, trying to crawl out of my own private pity parties when told by an old acquaintance that her husband was murder in a convenience store last year, weeping uncontrollably, laughing, becoming an iPhone addict and still maintaining a full blown diet coke addiction, learning to drink margaritas and still simply not liking beer, learning to be merciful and tender with others, learning to judge others less and less, learned to be thankful I live in a country where stoning sinners is against the law, buying my first tv set at 48 and working through the shame of buying something i didn't really "need" and the shame of buying what i did but didn't "deserve" (not logical i know), being grateful and comforted by those who could and would come alongside me in spite of my mess and love me--being merciful, forgiving and supportive without needing to beat me up with my frailties or wrongness, being grief stricken by those who could not, learning I am not superior or "more better" than anyone else, that making a horrible mistake and not knowing how to fix it does not make me some kind of addict or that i have a personality disorder, learning how to let go of what other's think about me and more importantly learning that i don't have to (and am not able to) remedy their wrong assumptions and false statements to make myself ok, learning to accept the fact that each of us can and really do some dumb incredibly hurtfully things that sometimes others can't recover from, that the bible really is filled with stories of people who made FUBAR of their lives-murders, adulterers, prostitutes, whores, polygamists, those who coveted and envied and screwed up regularly, tax collectors, even Pharisees and god claims these people as his own (amazing) and, in spite of their love for god, they never became perfect and holy during their life (dude! abraham lied because he was chicken and didn't trust god and so told some king his wife was his sister and gave her to him--yeah bet that was good for the marriage), and ..., watching and seeing that even in the worse of my messes, weird goodness happens, learning that sleeping on a futon and taking cold showers with a garden hose ain't so bad, making new friends and discovering those who were there all along, being told how my very vocal vulnerable cyber processing has helped others move toward forgiveness and moving them toward releasing bitterness in their own lives and me finding hope in that my crazy blog transparent processing helps others find their way through this crazy wonderful gift called life, today I find myself CLEANING MY STUDIO COURTYARD, FINALLY, after all these months. What a mess, she said with a smile since I've already had my cry for the day.

So NOW what am I going to do with the rest of this one wild and precious gift of life i have been given?

(disclaimer my list is far from exhaustive and absolutely not in any prioritized order and yes I know that my typos abound)

“I always feel that the margins tell you more than the center of the page ever could.”
Marcia Tucker

Seagulls

Today is the first good day to work outside my studio in BOX
courtyard. The weather is perfect and it is so weird and wonderful to
hear the seagulls.

Maybe today will be a good day. I will try to make it so.

March tenth two thousand and ten

This is what I will choose to believe about this day. It is how I am going to choose to remember it. So I will store it away as a mercy, I will ascribe to them acts of kindness; I will not analyze for fault; I will not look for wrong doing or darkness; I will not consider what I cannot know; I believe they are good. I will believe they can find healing; I believe they will know peace; I believe they are loved; I believe they will experience the healing balm of forgiveness and grace; I will believe they can forgive. I will believe in all that I know is good in them. And I will love them from afar but I will let go of my need for what they cannot give. as I too have done only that which I was able. Perhaps one day my capacities will be different, but today I followed as I was able. God is big enough to handle and forgive where you and I are not able and to love us both dearly. God is able.

What is god saying to me; what is he asking me to do?

"in human tragedy, there is something the Father wants us to do to bring healing."
Thomas Keating

treading where no one hears the echo of her foot fall

Opens this evening.

[WaTW] This Saturday 7-9pm - Kathryn Kelley: treading where no one hears the echo of her foot fall - Join Us!

Please join us this Saturday for an opening reception with
Kathryn Kelley
treading where no one hears the echo of her foot fall
Saturday, March 6, 7 to 9pm



March 6 - April 15, 2010


Houston based artist Kathryn Kelley up-cycles and reanimates objects of urban refuse into large fleshy sculptures that often stand in the place of the self. The impressive scale of these pieces creates a theatrical position for viewers who are confronted with gregarious forms, or intimations of the shadowed self. Remnant inner tubes, doors, frames and windows morph and mingle in these ambitious works.

You may read the artist's poetry online http://womenandtheirwork.org.  Kelley's writing inspired these new works.

Our exhibitions are funded and supported in part by the City of Austin through the Cultural Arts Division and by a grant from the Texas Commission on the Arts and an award from the National Endowment for the Arts, which believes that a great nation deserves great art.

Women & Their Work, 1710 Lavaca Street, Austin, TX 78701, 512-477-1064, Mon.- Fri. 10am –6pm  & Sat. 12-5pm http://www.womenandtheirwork.org