First, we learn to be quiet.
My grandmother kept dolls her entire life. Their porcelain faces lined up in rows like quiet watchers. They always unsettled me. Behind their stillness was something unresolved, a silence that mirrored her own. She was a survivor of childhood abuse, yet the systems that hurt her continued to live through her: in her rigid faith, her expectations of control, her strict ideals of womanhood.
Mirrors embody duality — they reveal truth but also illusion, self-awareness but also vanity. My grandmother’s youth of abuse is not a reflection of her, but of those who inflicted it.
My doll reflects the viewer’s own image back. She is meant to hold tension and tenderness together. It is an offering to my grandmother and to all women whose girlhoods were shaped by silence. May we be mirrors who reflect back truth.
Made for Side Rail Collective:
Invisible Threads:
Matrilineages of Blood, Time, and Place
Artist Receptions
Saturday, Feb 14th 4-8 PM: Show Opening
Saturday, Mar 14th 4-8 PM: Artist Reception
For inquiries:
Curator: Shawna Stewart
Gallery Manager: Essa Baird