Join us on January 18th for the opening of ‘Home is Here: A Return to Source with Ecofeminist Sarah Crooks’ between 6-8pm. Meet the artist, breathe in a truly remarkable body of work that reminds us of our deep connections to the Earth and each other. It’s free and open to all!
“May you walk in beauty,
May you see her beauty,
May you be her beauty.
Thank you for bearing witness to my story.” – Sarah Crooks
ABOUT THE EXHIBITION
Sarah Crooks has dedicated a decade to creating a body of work, a practice, and a series of rituals where she aligns her own healing journey with indigenous earth-based traditions and our collective need for reconciliation. With water as a connecting force, Crooks uses her artistic process as a spiritual practice to create a shared sense of place linking her own rebirth, our collective yearning to belong, and the required process of mourning in order to heal.
Through a series of large, complexly layered tapestries, found-object sculptures, drawings, and poems we are invited to join Crooks on a metaphorical pilgrimage to the subconscious where the Divine Femi- nine principal of unconditional love is retrieved, where home is found. Images have been washed, dyed, drawn, printed, sculpted and sewn and create a space, a meditation, to help us move from domi- nation to reciprocity, from the patriarchal to the feminine, from a history of colonization to a future of liberation and co-creation, and from exploitation of the landscape to recognizing her as the source that allows us to more fully connect to one another and the earth.
As a response to a time of personal trauma, fear, and rage Crooks began a practice of self discovery she calls Redirecting my Energy Daily (RED). It is a process of moving from from outside to inside, from ego to god. From arrogance and control to humility and hope. Her creative expression collectively called RED Pearl River is a result of this practice.
And it is a practice that takes place in a physical and spiritual geography of import, near the mouth of the St. Johns River. It is where the French explorers landed and started the European campaign. It is where Crooks has spent most of her life. “I believe the physical form of things stores and is shaped by the activities and the energies of those who have been there. Whether it is an artist’s hands or a slave culture, or sexual trauma, it is stored in our bodies and in the body of the earth, rattling around in our collective unconscious until, like a festering wound, rises upward seeking release,” writes Crooks. “When I open myself up to work, I am a conduit for these streams of consciousness which rise upwards seeking reconciliation, remembrance and healing.
“To me, coming home means to smell the briny sea of our mother’s womb, found in estuaries and tidal creeks along a salt marsh maze.”
This story as told through the art of Sarah Crooks is an affirmation of our birthright, of belonging to our earth home.
Funded in part by a Matching Project Grant from the State of Florida, an Art Ventures Grant from The Community Foundation of Northeast Florida, a Community First Cares Foundation Grant and The Cul- tural Council of greater Jacksonville, the The Home is Here project will travel in a series of pop up per- formances and installations down the 310-mile length of the St. Johns River. Yellow House, located near the mouth of the St. Johns River, serves as the start of this six month journey of building commu- nity by offering opportunities to mourn and celebrate our relationship with the natural world.