#yearofmeaning

Let the next year be the one which changes all.... Cheers to 2019!!! #newyear #2019 #yearofadventure #yolo #yearofmeaning #newlife (at Kerala) https://www.instagram.com/p/BsD9NGwhPkS/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=pnceg2prbigo

Community means we’re not only together for all the highs but also all the lows. Throughout this past year, I have seen neighbors and strangers take up the causes of an other simply because what they felt was each other’s personhood. That is what community means to me. – Zen She

I started making pottery as a means to engage what it is to “make”. There were teachers who shared their experiences with me, which taught me how to build with materials. I worked in many places growing up and now am an artist and potter, among other things. It took my environment and the collection of people to help me gain the skills that I have. The work that is shared for your birthday is two vases that sit next to each other. Community is an organism. I recognize my place within the structure. These two vessels are part of a community of objects that I have made within my life and hopefully with flower, other decorative objects, they can be a part of your world that connects us. Together we are all a part of a community, close and far. -- Kahlil

So I started thinking of the project from Travis in that light. I imagined a woman creating a community -- one where everyone was welcome: refugees, Muslims, Mexicans, homeless...the most inclusive community imaginable. I used techniques of collage, illustration, acrylic paint and digital illustration to create my interpretation of that. Then, a month ago, synchronicity came knocking when Chris King asked if I had a piece of art that might represent one of the poems of Armenian poet Marine Petrossian for a Poetry Scores exhibit at Mad Art (a mashup of poetry, art and music). The very first poem was “I wanted to Build a City,” which to my imagination, was exactly what I had created for your birthday. Exactly. So I lent them your birthday present. I’ll print the poem on the back and I wish you a lifetime of art and happy birthdays. -- Jeff

My thoughts on community drift towards the awareness of the may obstacles that threaten the ability of “all” people to come together and fellowship as one and the people who come together to tear down these obstacles. Documenting “protests’ over the past several years, I’ve come to view these activists as a community of sorts, much like a large family, filled with many of the same things you’d see in a family: joy, pain, dysfunction...but many times there’s love and hope.  – Howard

Every painting I create starts simply with a wash of color. The next steps involve countless layers of paint – some think, some thin, some wide and some narrow. They overlap, intertwine and sometimes cover each other up completely. I will sometimes scrape away paint revealing layers underneath. Often strange objects find their way into the piece and create unexpected surprises. My paintings and “community” are more than the sum of their parts. – Jennifer

As a muralist, I get to work with communities and create experiences that allow ownership of space. When someone paints on a wall, the wall becomes theirs. This direct engagement facilitates a dialog that encourages connection and helps build community. In the studio, I’ve been working on ideas and creating systems that I can create on a larger scale with different communities. In this piece, I’m looking at buildings and architecture, manipulating planes through perspective and color coding. In abstracting the space, what looks like it’s falling into space can then look like its coming out. – Ellie

Sometimes we are the ones that seek community in/with others…sometimes we are the ones that need to be helped and welcomed into the fold. Neither time is guaranteed to be easy or joyous…but they are necessary all the same. We must strive for the difficult, for the inclusive, for the other side. – Matty