Questioning, What’s Next?

QUESTIONING (What’s Next?) Bethany Garner

Stepping into the Cloth in Common Artists group as a new member is such an honor and privilege, and I am so pleased to share a piece of my artwork here with you. As the pandemic days have interrupted teaching and sharing skills in my community in Central Canada, I have been seriously considering the path to follow in my arts practice these days. We are living in a difficult to navigate time in our lives, and for many of us, the questions and wondering as we move through our days is somewhat daunting. What’s next? I hear that so often…

As I walked through my home and studio, preparing for this piece of work, I came across this beautiful piece of hand dyed cloth, monoprint on beautiful jacquard linen, with a strange and mysterious printing of what I have taken as a circulating, mysterious flow of colour, moving through the artist eye as she layered the colour and abstracted design play. I acquired this cloth from Cultured Expressions, and it was created by likely a young artist in Ghana. I will never know, but it has meaning for me. I celebrate the training and support of the young women who are leaning their skills though Lisa Shepherd and her work.

Knowing that I wanted to celebrate the many thousands of young women and girls making their way through Africa’s difficult days and wanting to support this beautiful design, I decided to try to question the “why, and what’s next” fear and the unknown of the C-19 Virus that I see moving through this piece of background cloth.

I searched my stash and found a collection of cloth that would remind me of travels through these lands and excite my colour palette as I brought together the ‘faces” of a group of women meeting together – questioning, in deep conversation and sharing the uncertainty around their lives. I created the drawing and quickly set to cutting out body shapes – unknown people with so many reasons to wonder “what’s next”.

A small detail of the stitching that added to the dimension of the cloth figures, the applique by machine and the blank faces …so much unknown. (Here and below)

Wishing the world well – focusing on the strength and positive contributions of coming together. All will be well… if we just question “what’s next” and move toward solving this worldwide dilemma.