Symbols of Ourselves

Symbols are really hard for me: “pick like a pivotal moment” you know, I don’t really feel like I have them. I have really small things, that when you look back you see that they matter. And, I kind of hesitate when it comes to identifying what a woman is with her equipment, you know, but it’s definitely a part of your life.  Like my hair. The pictures that I have, the way that I can place what was going on at the time and how old I was is based on my hair—sort of, “oh, that’s what was happening those three months when I had that color of hair.” I’ve been bald, black hair, really short hair, purple, this is the longest I’ve had my hair for ten years. It changes how you look at yourself and it really changes how people interact with you. When I had blond hair, I lived on a major street and I would get honked at all the time. Then when I dyed my hair brown, nobody beeped at me—it was incredible. But when I shaved my head, I lived close to my college and I was walking home and some guy in a pickup truck pulled up next to me and asked me if I wanted a ride. I figured out he thought I was a prostitute—and I was BALD. So you get expected things, like the blonde, you know, I expect certain things, but I was not expecting that at all. I mean, I know that people make assumptions about you by what you look like, so, I took my bra off and pressed that in the clay. Sometimes, you’re surprised by what you get.

Our Stories

Our stories overlap and what we tell needs to be seen many times. These stories come to us in surprising ways: we speak of a door knocker from Spain, the butterflies at our niece’s funeral, Jack’s mom’s table cloth, and our wedding rings. Our stories speak of peace signs, birds, smiles, and the last sunset we saw in Cuba. We tell of masks, dolphins, scissors, and the knife used to cut tomatoes at Tin Pot Annie’s when we were nineteen and ran away from responsibility. Our stories are told through the impressions left by vines, a braid of hair stamped into the clay that reminds us of shaving our head in order to try to get comfortable in our own skins, the names of our children, and, of course, the philosophy of Miss Piggy. Our histories are recounted through paint chips from our grandmother’s original home, Littlefoot, the key to the first hotel in Fort Collins owned by our family, our brother’s size 15 shoe, and our dogs. Grandfather’s Bolo tie and an arrowhead that stands in for the mountain lodge we consider home are maps of where we’ve been and how we got here. The squashed penny from Hawaii, the family necklace, Shakespeare’s pen, and tubes of artist’s paint help us remember to release and to breathe, Baseballs, golf tees, ribbons, pins,  and sea shells from Malta speak of three or more generations of women and family. We gather other people’s stories as our own and offer ours as companions to theirs.  When women tell their stories, a bit of the world shifts, sometimes cracks, and often is healed.

          The Voices of Women

 For centuries, women’s voices have been lost to us. Erased from the historical record, misinterpreted from male perspectives. When we wrote, our words were not saved, so we hid them in diaries and stored them in attics.  Some found the courage to speak out, and their words were labeled “irrational,” “uninformed,” and “improper.” Clever, we turned to quilts and “crafts” to tell our stories, protest injustices, and build new futures. We sang, danced, and passed along the stories of our lives in whatever ways we could.  The act of stamping our stories into clay is a courageous act, an act of defiance and a claim to be heard. It’s a reach for what’s to come and a pressing of our wisdom into something permanent.  When we stamp, we own. Lightly or firmly, we find a space to see the stories, make our marks, and trust that future generations of women will have the courage to listen, watch, stamp, and speak.

The circle

Power can be defined as understanding the cycle of relationships that occur between humans, other animals, and our spirits. When we are powerful, according to Native American author Paula Gunn Allen, we are “all linked within one vast living sphere.” This sphere is more than material; it is spiritual and it allows things, sometimes magical, to happen. This is the power of transformations: earth into clay, clay into stories, and stories into towers.  Women, too, are transformed within this sphere and the circle always has been a primary symbol of the female. Villages had round houses, round hearths, and round ceremonial spaces. Pagan sacred dances are circular, as are European folk dances, and even menstruation cycles. Prehistoric stone circles, such as Stonehenge, reflect this circular power, continuity, and a love of equality. Quilting bees happen around a quilt, arms hug around a child, women meet around tables. Earth, air, water, and fire form a circle, planets revolve, and rings reflect a cycle of infinity. The Sacred Hoop of life, according to Gunn Allen, is organized by unity, by the willingness of all individuals to find “a place in creation”—a place that privileges none, that allows all to “live in harmony with what is.” The tower, the circle, the sacred hoop, the medicine wheel, all call for a blending, a coming together of individual hands, hearts, and bodies so that we might participate in the creative flux, the fluidity and malleability of all aspects of this circle of life. 

The artist and her art

art \art\ n—more at ARM : [see also WINGS] 1 :  skill acquired by experience, study, or observation <the ~ of making friends> 2 a : a branch of learning b : archaic : LEARNING, SCHOLARSHIP 3 : familiar : the name of a good friend; what we create  even though we may not have acquired the skill by experience or study 4 : historical: what women’s work has not been called  5 a : woman centered :  an autobiographical, political, and collaborative process b :  the translation of a dream or experience into material objects c : calling one another by name, looking one another in the eyes, sharing our stories d : lifting a hand to give flight to a voice, an idea, and a vision

artist \art-est\ n 1 a : one who professes and practices an imaginative art b : a person skilled in one of the fine arts 2 : a skilled performer; specif: ARTISTE 3 a obs : one skilled or versed in learned arts b : archaic : PHYSICIAN : one who is adept at deception 4 : historical: a title only a man could hold 5 a : woman centered : one who smiles as she is working b : one who does not hesitate to stop to gather feathers for her wings c : a person who remembers her own worth d : someone who makes us think < the ~ said, “we just have to try”>

The Beginning

This started last May when I applied to do a great project in Oregon--for Portland State University--and they wanted some sculptures to go in a water path.  My great idea was that I’d build these totems that have symbols on them that represent women, and on top of every totem there would be a woman with wings. And I wanted to do seven. So I submitted that proposal. And then, I was here in the art room trying to figure out how to make this happen and there were some students in here on their off hour. I started rolling clay and pushing stamps into the clay and playing with it and telling them what I was trying to do, and they were so excited about it. And I said,  “If I get this, you guys should help me.” And Danielle said, “Mrs. Fowler, we should do it anyway.” 

Out of the mouths of babes, right? And that was before I was rejected, and that rejection actually started something even more wonderful. That idea became thirty towers, between 4 and 8 feet tall, all with a woman with wings on the top. And after the first session, the women involved said, “this has to go beyond Fort Collins.” So, now, we plan to cast the towers in bronze and place them around the community and then to take this around the nation—that is the plan, and we are going for it.  Because we know that most of the time when tributes and artistic sculptures are made, they are made to the wonderful men in our society. We have the forefathers, the founding fathers, the settlers, and all those really great guys, and we love those guys, but women need to be respected and honored and valued and have a voice as well. So, we’re doing this for women.