The CoVid 19 pandemic, the spread of sickness and death brought with it a more insidious pathology; apathy. Apathy of certain segments of the white population who believe their freedom was more important than the lives of people around them. Sitting in the unenviable demographic of persons more susceptible to contracting the virus as an African-American, I balked at the cavalier attitudes of my white counterparts and the disregard for my life and the
lives of people that I hold dear.
Sitting in this fuge, I began to visualize the process of the disease, the physical warning signs of the illness as reported in the initial phases of the pandemic. Pink-eye. Pink-eye with all its social connotations, the stigma, and the evidence of the virus taking hold. The natural combination of the side-eye with the pink-eye speaks to the disgust, anger, exhaustion, and incredulity of women of color regarding the social and racial ills of this country. The spark in creating this
segment of the series was in direct response to the pandemic in conjunction with the murders of African-American men and women at the hands of police and white “vigilantes.”
I reached out to women of color in my personal and artistic circles and requested a selfie with the side-eye as a prominent feature. I painted each subject's likeness, studying their features and what they were telling me behind their eyes. There was so much pain, anger and to-the bone fatigue of all the machinations of institutionalized racism swimming in their eyes. I painted them, adding contour and meaning, leaving the introduction of the pink to their eyes for last as a
closing statement of all the elements that can kill us, yet bond us in an unbreakable sisterhood.