It was suggested that I post my quilt on the blog, and ergo, here I am posting it :) My name is Sarah States, and if you have any questions about my quilt, feel free to ask them.(Click on the quilt to see a larger version)
TOP LEFT: Photography has always been a passion of mine. I graduated with an Interdisciplinary degree in Art and Communication from Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan last May, and my artistic emphasis was photography. The image of bodies with graffiti is from a series that I just completed and have a show for on the 23rd of September.
TOP RIGHT: I find gender to be an extremely fascinating topic, and while at Calvin I also had minors in Gender Studies and Sociology. The school I attended was rather conservative and Christian, and one of my reasons
for taking this class is to compare the difference between this class and the classes I have already taken in this discipline. The trifecta gender image represents how I prefer to see gender as more of a spectrum instead of a dichotomy, but at the same time because of our socialization, it can be difficult to approach things in a nongendered fashion. And while I appreciate all genders, I am particularly interested in women's issues; which is why the yoni symbol is represented.
BOTTOM LEFT: I find myself with perpetual wanderlust, and I travel as much as I am able. I almost always utilize Couchsurfing in my travels. Couchsurfing is an online community of people who let travelers stay on their couch for free. Something about the hospitality of strangers always restores my faith in humanity a little more each time I participate.
BOTTOM RIGHT: My pet snake Parsley and I are definitely kindred spirits. It seems to me as though the general dislike of snakes and unfounded distrust of women both stream from the Genesis creation story. And whether inherent or not (I do not know), but women in particular have a definite connection to nature, and the bookWomen Who Run With the Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype certainly confirms my belief of this.
"So what is the Wild Woman? ... She is the Life/Death/Life force, she is the incubator. She is the intuition, she is the far-seer, she is deep listener, she is loyal heart. She encourages humans to remain multilingual, fluent in languages of dreams, passion, and poetry. She whispers from night dreams, she leaves behind on the terrain of a
woman's soul a course hair and muddy footprints. These fill women with longing to find her, free her, and love her. She is ideas, feelings, urges, and memory. She has been lost and half forgotten for a long, long time. She is the source of light, the night, the dark, and daybreak. She is the smell of good mud and the back leg of the fox. The birds which tell us secrets belong to her. She is the voice that says, "This way, this way."
