Janet Lenore Stein

The collective theme of the 2024 LABA fellowship inspired me to develop a vocabulary of images using the white pencil on the black pages that each of us were given.

Under the cover of the night, nothing is clearly delineated. What is perceived or remembered or imagined become mixed and synthesized. Under the cover of night escape from danger can be facilitated, private moments can be shared, intuition and longing can be unleashed and little can be controlled.

Inspired by the drawings I made during the course of the program, my imagination was ignited.

My project proposes to intertwine the experiences of women of the diaspora by employing the motif of the leg or boot as a metaphor for strength, endurance, perseverance in the face of the unknown and at the heels of peril, like the mast of a ship on turbulent seas, or the trunk of the tree of life.

I think that we inherit knowledge, notions, memories and longings from the experiences of our forefathers and mothers, and that these are possibly shared collectively. Emotions and memories can be provoked visually through forms, shapes, colors and materials as poems employ words.