FUZE Week 11

One of my least favorite words ever was the theme this week. Vulnerable… shudder!!! I come from a long line of proud and stubborn stock. If you’ve ever met members of my immediate or extended family you know that I’m not exaggerating here. Vulnerability does not come easily for me. In fact, I often see it as weakness… It’s setting your self up for hurt and that’s just stupid. In an effort to honor this weeks theme in mind but also be wisely self preserving (as needed) I took to heart Matthew 10:16, “be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”

The FUZE week (which is Friday- Thursday) always starts with B and I sharing a lazy cup of coffee at her house. This week started a little differently as our boss was visiting. We still had our coffee, but I was on my best behavior. Knowing that it is my hope and intention to return to Australia after my internship to work with MTW fulltime helping B further develop and run FUZE I really wanted to make a good impression on my Grand-boss. In situations like this I tend to over share in a way that often looks like verbal bulimia. In this case I had to be vulnerable but wise in knowing when to stop, not out of self-preservation but simply not reaching the point of overkill.

This week I was moving into my new studio in Freo. As I was meeting and getting to know the other artists in the building there was a very different type of vulnerability needed. The first questions artists tend to ask each other when meeting are “what kind of work do you make?” Typically in an effort to protect myself from scrutiny, judgment, exclusion, or further questioning I sidestep this question. Saying my work is couched in the feminine and abstractly explores the processes and rituals surrounding the domestic sphere through reenacting and/or recreating them. But the fact of the matter is my work is often about grace and uses the familiar language of the domestic to point to heaven, process and rituals to point to change or growth, and object to give form to abstract ideas such as hope (like in Now and Not Yet). It took a lot of vulnerability for me to confidently have that conversation with my new studio mates.

The very last day of vulnerability week while I was on my way out to Steve and B’s for the day, at the bus stop I was reading Visual Faith, by William Dyrness. There was a middle aged middle-eastern man also waiting for the bus. Seeing the title of my book and a folder of magazine clippings sticking out of my bag asked me if I was an art student. I simply said not anymore, but I had been and I was a working artist. We chatted for a while and when he asked me about my work I told him about Now and Not Yet at churchfreo.

I told him about the hope and promise of heaven that I have been given through the work of Christ that we remember at Easter. In that few minutes while we waited for our bus, using my artwork as the vehicle I was able to speak to this man about grace. As the 851 bus pulled into the station he turned to me and asked what church I had shown my work at, and was it still up. Unfortunately, the installation had come down weeks ago but I gave him my website address. I don’t know if he looked at my work or if he was just being polite. The point is the same regardless. I had an opportunity and the ability to have a conversation where Christ was proclaimed through art.

As we progressed through vulnerability week I encountered situations that required more and more vulnerability from me. With each event I came across I realized more and more that it was not out of a place of weakness that my vulnerability was coming, quite the opposite actually. It took a lot of bravery, confidence, and wisdom (obviously, not my own)… not to be confused with pride or stubbornness.