Lighting A Creative Fire Under My Own Ass!
So, by now you know that I am trying to get the photographs from when we were in the hospital into the space of a gallery. Well, it has been so slow going as the pain of writing has hindered me. For whatever reason I just get stuck when it comes to the "artists statement", and in this case the "Exhibition Proposal". I have re-discovered a local gallery, that has just moved and is sort of starting anew just one town away from me. It's not always looked on well to just email a gallery if they are not actively seeking artists submissions, even so, I contacted this gallery and found out that they are actively seeking submissions for there next year of shows. So, here I sit slowly moving out of my writers block with a very rough proposal draft. I hope that you are not sick of my asking for opinions, but girls I need your help once again.
Here are some basic elements that I have tried to slip into the proposal.
*Your ideas, purpose or concept,
*Why you would like to exhibit at this Gallery,
* What benefit or relevance it would have to the local community
If you can, can you give me your critique if I am close at all with this proposal?
I believe in the important role photography plays in capturing important moments in one's life and in other's lives. For many, the first photographs of a newborn, perhaps their own child will become the most joyful and treasured family photographs that will be reveled over year after year, and passed from generation to generation with pride.
For some, those first moments, those most happy and life changing moments will never exist. Instead the first look and feel of their newborn child will be filled with silence and tears. I am speaking of the death of a child, in my own history and specific to the work in which I am proposing to show I am speaking of the stillbirth of my first born child. Following the death of my daughter I requested my camera be brought to me. What followed was a very natural desire to capture my daughters pureness, and beauty. Even though my heart felt as though it had been violently ripped from my being and a dark sadness had taken hold of my soul....I was compelled to photograph my child. I never gave it a second thought, and nobody told me that I could not do what felt like the right thing.
These photographs although obviously personal and intense hold so much importance for so many. They hold importance for all the 1,000's of other families who have suffered the loss of their children, they also, I believe can and should become important for our society as a whole. Important in that our fear of death and dying has become so quieted and tucked away since the "death" of post-mortem photography as the cultural "norm".
Family Portrait is an exploration of the invisibility and denial of grief in our American society. Why do we hide from grief, from our own pain and sorrow, and the pain and sorrow of others? Why do we as a culture encourage this behavior in each other? What are we ashamed of? I ask this question specifically when the death we hide from is that of a child, the most unacceptable of deaths.
Through these photographs I seek to flush out the much needed conversation about death that is laking in our society today. As well as raising the awareness for the many "invisible" deaths that occur every year in this country and around the world. Showing these photographs at A.P.E., has great relevance as there are many local families who have been touched by the death of a child. The short lives of our children need not be silenced anymore, our invisible grief needs to and should be seen.
What do you think? Does it get to the point at all? Do I make a good enough argument to show in the gallery? Do I make the subject worthy enough with my writing?
HELP!
4 comments:
First I should say that I've never had to write such a proposal, so I'm not sure if any thing is missing. I am an editor, so I couldn't resist tightening a few things up (since you asked) just to make your ideas stand out more clearly.
I believe that photography captures important moments people’s lives. For many, the first photographs of a newborn become joyful and treasured family photographs that will be reveled over year after year, and passed from generation to generation with pride.
For some, those first moments, those most happy and life-changing moments never exist. Instead the first look and feel of their newborn child is filled with silence and tears. I am speaking of the death of a child, specifically stillbirth.
I propose to show a collection of birth images from the stillbirth of my first born child. Following the death of my daughter, I requested that my camera be brought to me. What followed was a very natural desire to capture my daughter’s pureness and beauty. Even though my heart felt as though it had been violently ripped from my being and a dark sadness had taken hold of my soul, I was compelled to photograph my child.
These photographs, although obviously personal and intense, hold importance for many others. They hold importance for all the thousands of other families who have suffered the loss of a child; they also, I believe, are important for our society as a whole because they bring to the forefront a very real part of life, despite our culture’s fear of and silence about death and dying.
Family Portrait is an exploration of the invisibility and denial of grief in our American society. It asks: Why do we hide from grief, from our own pain and sorrow, and the pain and sorrow of others? Why do we as a culture encourage this behavior in each other? What are we ashamed of? Through Family Portrait, I ask these questions specifically about the death of a child, the most unacceptable of deaths.
Through these photographs I seek to flush out the much needed conversation about death that is lacking in our society today. I also hope to raise awareness of the many "invisible" deaths that occur every year in this country and around the world. Showing these photographs at A.P.E., has great relevance as there are many local families who have been touched by the death of a child. The short lives of our children need not be silenced anymore, our invisible grief needs to and should be seen.
Good luck with the proposal. I hope you get a show!
Dear Birdie's Mama,
I am a freshman English and literature teacher at the college level (or at least I was until I got sick and couldn't do it anymore), and would love to help you out with this!
In the first paragraph, try to avoid word repetition. Maybe say "defining" or "watershed" or "pivotal" moments instead of "important" ones so as to avoid it in the first sentence? Also, remember to use TWO spaces between sentences (not one). In the second sentence I would take out "perhaps their own child" because it doesn't contribute much, and just say "For many, the first photographs of their newborn will become the most joyful and treasured of family photographs..."
In the second paragraph, please remember to hyphenate the compound adjective "life-changing." And again, TWO spaces between sentences, and I would change "look and feel to "impression" in the first sentence. Then after that I'd get all chop-happy and probably change the whole second sentence to something like "Neonatal loss, or the death either before or during the birth of a newborn, is specific to my own personal history and in the work that I am proposing to show I document the stillbirth of my first child." In the next sentence it should read "requested THAT my husband" (or whoever actually did it) "bring me my camera." This is because the way you had it the sentence is passive--I used to tell my students to give their work the "by my grandma" test. If you can tack that onto your sentence (i.e. "I requested that my camera be brought to me by my grandma") and have it make sense then it is passive, and this is grating to the educated reader. By putting the verb inside the sentence you keep the person reading this more "in the moment." After that, and this may be a matter of personal taste here where you should feel free to overrule me, I would tone down the feelings a bit, since this is after all a business proposal of sorts. Perhaps you might say "While of course I was devastated by my daughter's unexpected death, I was compelled to photograph my child, with myself and my husband, didnt give it a second thought. To me it felt like the right thing to do, to create the only memories we could of our brief time as a family."
In the next paragraph, I would urge you to add a comma after "photographs" in the first sentence, and another one after the word "intense," and instead of ending that one "for so many" and then repeating yourself, just merge the first and second sentences to read "...hold so much importance for so many, because thousands" (and here I would urge you to look up the exact number per year in America and quote it specifically) "of families go through this terrible experience each year, something that our society seems to overlook as a whole." Then maybe follow that up with something about how "post-mortem photography, once the norm, has now fallen out of fashion, and I believe that there is still a place for this, depending on each individual family's feelings on the matter, but especially when you are talking about the death of a newborn, whose family don't have (in italics) any other pictures by which to remember their beloved child."
In your next paragraph, I'd cut "our" from the first sentence. Sounds more scholarly that way ;) In the second sentence you've got the repetition issue again, although I think "Why do we hide from grief, from fully feeling and processing our own most painful memories, and shy away from the grief of others?" Then in the last sentence I think I'd change it to read "I ask this question specifically when the death we hide from is that of a neonate, the most unacceptable and unacknowledged of deaths."
In the last paragraph I think you meant "flesh out" not "flush out," although I could be wrong. In fact, "flesh out" might not be the best choice of words given the subject matter, you might want to say "make a meaningful contribution to the much-needed" (again, hyphenate compound adjectives!) "discourse in the artistic community about death in today's society." I know, I really switched that one around...feel free to run edits by me if you want--I dont publicise my e-mail but if you leave me a comment on my blog I moderate them all and won't publish yours if you ask me not to--you can give me your e-mail there and I'll happily answer you that way. Also, I think I'd replace the period at the end of the first sentence of that paragraph with a comma and merge it with the second. The comma after "A.P.E." is unnecessary so you can remove that, and after "great relevance" you might say something along the lines of "to the community, as through our experience my husband and I have met many local families who have been touched by the death of a newborn." (I know some lost older kids, but you want to stay focused on your subject matter). The last sentence might be a little too...I don't know, "agenda-driven," perhaps? Remember, you're trying to prove the relevance of your collection and "sell" it to the gallery, not educate them (the photos, if and when they see them, will speak for themselves). You might go with something more like "The short lives of the children of families touched by a loss like ours need not remain invisible, and our very real and overwhelming grief deserves recognition; it is my hope that this exhibit will not only move and speak to families like mine, but make people whose lives have not been touched by such a loss have more compassion for friends and family of theirs whose lives may be."
I hope I didn't come off like a total know-it-all! I only responded like this because you asked for feedback, and feel free to ignore any and all of what I just said (although you really should remember to use two spaces between paragraphs and hyphenate compound adjectives!), because this is YOUR story to tell. I am just hoping that by presenting a more polished introduction, you'll stand a better chance at getting this collection the recognition it so richly deserves, not only for Birdie but for the other families, and friends and family of those families, who have experienced a loss like yours and Matt's!
Good luck with A.P.E., and please as always keep us posted! "Eliza"
I was going to get all editorial, but I think the first two commenters really covered all I was going to say about the text as it stands now.
What I was wondering about is that there is no mention of the aspect of the work that is about creating new images from the limited set you had. I thought that was a very moving part of the story, and also perhaps relevant to an art gallery. Or did the focus of the work change since you started this last year and I just missed it? If it is still the same project, I think adding something about that aspect of it would be very helpful.
I suck as an editor but I really just wanted to say I am so glad you are going to be showing your work. Remember to tell us where so we can go take a peek.
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