Emily Rake – Anniversary Art Exhibition

• Artist Portfolio Magazine – 5 Year Anniversary Art Exhibition
• Emily Rake – Marietta, OH

Grand Theft Mother
Behind every Grandmother is a less grand mother, you must lead the way. Only relinquish the crown upon the deathbed, despite the temptation.

The Daughter has no experience. No one else is qualified and you’ve got nothing better to do.

To be a Grand-mother,

One must be at the ready to document important life accomplishments of your granddaughter, by any means you find necessary. Always be watching. You will enjoy whatever it is she accomplishes in the moment, however, not as much as you will in the future.

One must properly nest. To do this, consider the time in your granddaughter’s life in which she will need you most and realize that you may not be there for it. Nest not for the now, but for the end. Stay ahead of the game, this is what is truly grand.

Remain sane enough to give good advice and deliver it in a way that will be memorable. Be Creative. The future is alive and just yelling confessions of love out the window are not embarrassing enough anymore for such an abstract idea to really sink in.

Above all, take charge. You are still the boss, until their Grandfather gets home. Use your time wisely. Which wont be hard because you are wise now.

Here, Cute and Disturbing imagery is analogous to Jungian Persona and Shadow – – this archetypal binary acts as a vehicle to portray themes of obedience, vulnerability, resistance, and acceptance.
“Cute” is the unmarked signifier of the binary. “Cute” is analogous to Persona; on the surface, it is acting as a façade. Cute is a quality of falseness in the same way Persona is not an entirely true portrayal of a person – – its hook is amusement and comfort. “Cute” is immature, developed for the approval of others. “Disturbing” (i.e. disgust, horror, and terror) is the marked signifier. “Disturbing” is analogous to the shadow; it embodies all that is considered socially unacceptable and represented by the uncomfortable. The paintings are often made to be excessively cute, thereby becoming disturbing, a reference to the semi-charlatanism of the Persona becoming a quality that one would associate with the Shadow. These two entities melt together to form the aforementioned binary construct on which society’s rules are founded. Pushing the medium beyond what is considered painting asserts the same idea that is presented by the proposal to consider the world beyond the concept of the binary.
By making my Granddaughter’s bedroom, I am addressing the interminable cycle of the female role. She is coming into an age of importance, one that is represented in the media (women age 20-30 are 71 percent of all women represented on TV). I am adopting the role of a woman whose age makes me less important, one that is represented less in the media (women age 40 and over make up 26 percent of all women on TV). My granddaughter is inheriting the importance that I had already experienced and have seen the end of. I am teaching her how to handle the time in her life in which she is considered most important, when she is reproductively useful, from what I learned in my experience.