I grew up a white woman in affluent America. This oil on canvas painting explores my experience of examining my complicity and resulting fragility when examining my privilege as a white woman. It examines my desire to make the view of myself more acceptable. Well-meaning. Safe.
The title references MLK’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” in which he states,” I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient season."
Holding thistle is prickly, it’s softest edge being the bloom. What mental calisthenics do we use to avoid our shame? What tone policing do we find ourselves using to justify our indifference or our outrage at civil disobedience?
24 in. X 24 in. oil on gallery wrapped canvas, framed in a silver floating wood frame. It is the second in a series examining white fragility through the visual metaphor of the thistle flower.
Available for purchase, but must be available for submission and display to shows thru 2021. DM me so we can discuss availability and shipping.