toccopolasam

Artist Statement:

I'm an outsider artist of women's traditional arts. I've been categorized both as a folk artist and south Gothic artist. I'm not sure either category fits me, but I know my art is informed by a feminine gaze. I distrust labels of this kind. Like my grandmother sewing, I do this because I consider it beautiful.

I believe in making art that has a narrative, one that creates an ambiance contributing to the visual effect of the work. Like all Southerners raised in the specter of Lost Cause discourse, memories haunt me and my work as an artist.

Although southern Gothic is generally rendered in ockers and gray because of multiple layers of decay on the genre, I use garish, Madi Gras colors in defiance of the myth that Scarlett O Hara is alive and well and living in Toccopola. My art searches the landscape for signs of the new south, I'm trying to scrape off the Mary Kay and show the real face however pock-marked of lady antebellum.

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