Beckie’s sculpture “Overwhelmed: The Artist in Quarantine Cleans Out Her Office” has been selected for exhibition at the Springfield Museum– This Is Us: Regional Portraiture Today. The exhibition runs February 6–May 2, 2021
Below is the statement about the work that was included with the submission.
Like so many others in quarantine, I dove into some long neglected household projects to focus pandemic anxiety and try to make good use of the enforced time at home. In an early burst of energy, I cleared multiple years of outdated tax files from the attic, but then I had an office (and a closet, and the studio floor) full of boxes of tax papers that needed to be shredded. The papers were a mental and physical burden. Their presence taunted me, and the chaos of the papers and boxes became a metaphor for the cluttered weight of my anxious thoughts. As a mask maker in this year of masking, I should have been bursting with ideas, but I was finding it hard to summon the energy for creative studio time. At last, a creative breakthrough arrived– why not turn this overwhelming burden of office work into a self-portrait of what it felt like to be in the middle of this time in history. Once I envisioned the sculpture, shredding the papers wasn’t taking me away from work, it WAS my work. The creation of the portrait became a fun (and productive) outlet for pandemic angst.
39″ x 36″ x 36″
neoprene mask rubber with acrylic, chicken wire, shredded paper and plastic garbage bag
