Tag: COVID

Mask Gleaners by Donald Patten

Artist’s Statement

Almost overnight, COVID-19 had changed the way people interact with each other, and with our own bodies. We lived our lives in vulnerability during that historically significant time of disaster. The initial phases of the pandemic are behind us, but the virus remains and continues to be dangerous. The societal trauma this pandemic has caused will be remembered and felt by those who have lived through it for the foreseeable future.

In the past, master painters would depict historically significant disasters that happened to them as a way to cope. Artists of the 19th century depicted hardships and trauma in the wake of the Industrial Revolution, which began the formation of our modern world. As an artist learning the techniques of masters, I have the opportunity to create long-lasting visual information that depicts the trauma of this pandemic.

Therefore, I have created a series of drawings that represent my experiences in modern COVID life by drawing inspiration from past masterpieces that depict the embodied experience of trauma. This drawing is inspired by the oil painting Gleaners made by Jean-François Milletin 1857. Gleaners symbolizes the hardship peasants experienced in rural France surviving on gleaned grain after massive industrial farms take the majority of the harvested crops, leaving scraps for the old and poor. During the pandemic disposable face masks were common litter people would throw them away after using them. It was very common to see masks on the ground as trash. My drawing Mask Gleaners emphasizes how ubiquitous face masks were as litter, critiquing how our society disregarded masks as disposable trash, while they provided an important function to help prevent the spread of COVID.

Donald Patten is an artist and cartoonist from Belfast, Maine. He creates oil paintings, illustrations, ceramics and graphic novels. His art has been exhibited in galleries throughout Maine. To view his online portfolio, visit @donald.patten on Instagram.

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Twin Pandemics, Twin Cities

By AJ Donley

 

They warn you about the dangers
that you’ll be feverish
that your throat will hurt
that it’s contagious
that you won’t be able to breathe

they try to scare you away from action
with the risk of symptoms
that have always been there

because COVID is new
but racism is not

I wear a mask to protect my loved ones
from the pandemic that affects them
my white friends and family
worry about what goes into their lungs
when people of color are breathing in
the soot from communities we’ve burned
to the ground then blamed on riots
we doused them in gasoline and got mad
when they lit a match to keep warm
no wonder they can’t breathe

Now I’m feverishly marching
my throat hurts from screaming
anger is contagious—but so is justice—
let it infect you
lest it kills you

 

AJ graduated from the University of Minnesota, Morris with a BA in psychology and English. She also has her MA in forensic psychology from the University of North Dakota. Currently working in the sexual violence field, she seeks to explore the human psyche and illustrates what she sees with poetry. AJ plays with form, language, and imagery in an attempt to interpret what she experiences. She seeks decadence and authenticity and piercing honesty. Poetry is a practice and is never complete; just as the mind is subjective and dynamic, so too is her writing.

Photo credit: Dominic Dominic Jacques-Bernard via a Creative Commons license.

A note from Writers Resist

Thank you for reading! If you appreciate creative resistance and would like to support it, you can make a small, medium or large donation to Writers Resist from our Give a Sawbuck page.