Susan G. Emmerson, Subsidence
Subsidence
ink and gouache on paper
40 x 32 "
Website: susanemmerson.com
Instagram: @sgemmerson
About | This past few years have, for most of us, profoundly changed our relationship with physical space, especially the formerly safe space of home. Homes for some have become unbearably confining, for some uncertain or nonexistent and for others a desolate empty place to grieve. Natural and man-made disasters have destroyed others, leaving the inhabitants only sad scraps and distorted debris. In many ways we have reacted by turning inward, not only from our external space but into ourselves.
My most recent work considers this emotional and physical devastation created by the loss of home. Home is where our most basic human needs - nourishment, rest and safety - are supposed to be met. When these are lost we are set adrift, grieving for security and permanence. This is “hiraeth,” a Welsh word for a profound homesickness for a home you can’t return to, or that may have never existed. Many of my drawings and sculptures formally involve images of homes beyond repair, collapse, burning, destruction, ripping, tearing, falling. I draw homes because they are us; the places where we can be the most real and where we can dream in peace.
$2,400