Consequences: A series
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24,820 Times
For the past seventeen years I have been tracking my life with blood, drop by drop. I have diabetes. Testing blood glucose levels three to four times daily is a normal routine for diabetics. I, however, have never entirely accepted my illness and testing is a constant battle.
It might be a bit of blood before breakfast or dinner, but every test is redundant, every test stripe is a tally mark and every drop punctuates questions of guilt, regret and doubt. The counting continues with the amount of carbohydrates I eat daily, the amount of insulin I give daily, the medical bills, the appointments, and soon my blood and frustrations are dripping from my finger.
I stopped testing for some time as a secret rebellion against my disease. I was ignoring my diabetes, not testing and not seeing a doctor like I wanted but I became ill and depressed. I eventually started getting help and faced my disease.
I am a diabetic and a painter. I have been using oils in a gestural abstract style with a graphite line running through most of my pieces. With past paintings I attempted to overwhelm the viewer with size. After making large paintings, I have reduced the size of my works to make them more intimate for the viewer and myself. Recently I have stepped away from paint and began using India ink, red colored pencil and graphite on paper. I feel these mediums combined portray a sense of my struggle to viewers with direct gestures and more emotion.
Represented in my most recent drawings is a tally of blood sugar tests those that I've done in the past and the ones I should've been doing.
The act of marking each dash is a reminder of my personal battle with diabetes, the lack of control I have over it, the memories of struggling with it when I was younger and my life before diabetes. The physical creation of each mark begins to hurt my hand as I continually make dashes and the motion itself becomes a fight.
I also use my blood to continue the mark making. Done in the same process as actual blood glucose testing, I place my blood on paper and force myself to test my blood sugar at the same time. Seeing so much of my blood at once made me light-headed - a reaction I wasn't expecting. - 2012
It might be a bit of blood before breakfast or dinner, but every test is redundant, every test stripe is a tally mark and every drop punctuates questions of guilt, regret and doubt. The counting continues with the amount of carbohydrates I eat daily, the amount of insulin I give daily, the medical bills, the appointments, and soon my blood and frustrations are dripping from my finger.
I stopped testing for some time as a secret rebellion against my disease. I was ignoring my diabetes, not testing and not seeing a doctor like I wanted but I became ill and depressed. I eventually started getting help and faced my disease.
I am a diabetic and a painter. I have been using oils in a gestural abstract style with a graphite line running through most of my pieces. With past paintings I attempted to overwhelm the viewer with size. After making large paintings, I have reduced the size of my works to make them more intimate for the viewer and myself. Recently I have stepped away from paint and began using India ink, red colored pencil and graphite on paper. I feel these mediums combined portray a sense of my struggle to viewers with direct gestures and more emotion.
Represented in my most recent drawings is a tally of blood sugar tests those that I've done in the past and the ones I should've been doing.
The act of marking each dash is a reminder of my personal battle with diabetes, the lack of control I have over it, the memories of struggling with it when I was younger and my life before diabetes. The physical creation of each mark begins to hurt my hand as I continually make dashes and the motion itself becomes a fight.
I also use my blood to continue the mark making. Done in the same process as actual blood glucose testing, I place my blood on paper and force myself to test my blood sugar at the same time. Seeing so much of my blood at once made me light-headed - a reaction I wasn't expecting. - 2012
Emily Seeman Art l © 2017 emilycseeman.com all rights reserved l Created by: E.Seeman
