When I was in school at SFAI a teacher, I won’t mention his name because I like him very much, but he said things like:
“Marin housewives making monoprints, just smeared paint” with a gesture with his hand and an expression on his face that contained every sexist feeling held by white artist men of his generation and before.
I didn’t say anything, I knew I wasn’t part of the group of monoprinting smearers, that I had expertise when it came to printmaking and my subject matter was far from the subject of pretty colors.
Yesterday I didn’t have time to work in my studio. It was Sunday, I overslept. I spent the day with my husband and babies hiking, cooking food, reading books, giving baths and changing diapers.
At snack time when the babies woke from their naps, and I was playing in my books coloring and staining and the babies were coloring and eating crayons I heard my teacher and his disdain for “marin housewives” I heard the writing spoken “She’s just a bored housewife” and I got mad and insecure at the same time.
Feeling art done in the kitchen is somehow lesser than art done in the studio. That art done by a woman in the kitchen while her children are present is not serious art.
It’s left me pondering, it’s left me feeling more political.
I can’t do anything about racism, sexism, terrorism, hate, and violence.
I can paint and write. I can wake up at 4:00am in the morning and work in my studio.