Pressure, detail. House paint on wall, 104 x 120 inches. 2017
“Manifest Destiny” proponent Marcus Whitman wasn’t disturbed by the displacement of American Indians brought on by the settlement of white people on stolen lands in western Oregon. He held that by refusing conversion to Christianity, Indians were relinquishing rights to their own property. “When a people refuse or neglect to fill the designs of Providence,” he asserted, “they ought not to complain about the results.”
Refusing Providence was a two-person exhibition of works on paper and fabric mounted in collaboration with Houston-based artist David Janesko at Flatlands Gallery in December 2017 - January 2018. We thought of the works in this show as byproducts of anxiety – fear in varying degrees of extremity brought on by rapidly changing forces governing modern life. Having experienced Hurricane Harvey and witnessed its devastating effects on friends, family and the landscape of Southeast Texas, we used this monumental weather event as a departure point through which we each examined and deconstructed our own fears. The act of examining, of looking at and facing, embodies a willingness to embrace vulnerability, which we believe leads to a deeper understanding of the self in relation to the rest of the world, in the context of growing uncertainty.
It is within this self-knowledge that we find power, enabling a potential turning of tables upon circumstance – thereby constituting an act of refusal and resistance.
