It’s common for unresolved trauma to be passed along to children. “Trauma can inform nearly everything about the way we exist and engage with our worlds, including the ways we parent and model behaviors for children,” says Lurie. My thing is how do you heal? You strip it away.The effects of intergenerational trauma can impact many parts of your life, from how you see yourself to how you communicate with others. And the oppression is what's left over - the intergenerational trauma. She breaks down the colour palette for me: "White is the colonization. A core theme running through Swain's work is violence against black women, and in this performance, she centres many of them - hanging various dresses on a clothes line, wringing out the fabric and revealing the names written on them before undressing herself. It's an invite-only performance with an audience made up entirely of black women whose names are incorporated into the show. We move from her studio to her laptop so that she can show me a video of a performance art installation she conducted earlier this year at The Theatre Centre called The Gathering. If I wasn't mad, would I be able to create this? - Gloria Swain, artist and activist It's very therapeutic too." This practice has a purpose beyond aesthetic, as Swain works frequently with people who have various disabilities and considers how they may be able to engage with her work. I think I'm the only artist who asks people to touch. She encourages me to feel them, asking me, "Is it cool or what? My stuff is touchable. Much of Swain's abstract work is textured using glue guns and fabric to create works that jump off the canvas. "What my parents was fighting, I'm fighting, and this generation is fighting the same thing." The Civil Rights Movement is often defined in the public memory as a moment history defined by legal battles and activist mobilization but Swain considers it from a more intimate perspective of trauma and violence. Originally from West Virginia, Swain grew up in an era still deeply rooted in segregation. However, she also transcends her individual narrative by imagining the stories of her ancestors, tracing four generations of black women's suffering. Swain describes them as her story with mental health, and the images of razor blades dripping with blood, needles and medication bottles provide arresting visuals of her personal experiences. Swain shows me a series of black ink sketches done on 3x5 canvasses that bring to mind the early silhouette works of Kara Walker. If I wasn't mad, would I be able to create this?" People say, 'Do you feel exposed?' I say, 'No.' I feel in control because I'm telling the story. "People say, 'Why do you call yourself a mad artist?' I'm reclaiming the term because it used to be used as a negative. Swain's solo installation last year at Tangled Art Gallery was an exploration into her experience as a black woman in the mental health system, entitled Mad Room. When she began researching her family's history and saw the patterns of mental illness in the experiences of her sister, her aunt and her mother, she began to draw the intergenerational threads and recognize her trauma as something that also had historical and political roots. "I think the system has changed now but I go to my doctor and I say, 'I'm depressed.' He says, 'I can't give you medication because if I do, I have to report you to Children's Aid." Swain began to recognize her experience as part of a larger societal pattern. While Swain underwent treatment, she also battled depression and struggled to find adequate treatment while taking care of her daughter. This experimentation indirectly led her to the world of abstract art. Joint disease made her regular painting practice painful holding smaller tools was close to impossible, so she began experimenting with other devices like paint scrapers, scrubbing brushes, spray paint and her hands. During this time, art - which has always been a part of her life - became her lifeline. Watching her dance onstage at Pride or holding court at the Tangled Arts Gallery, few would guess that less than 15 years ago Swain was diagnosed with a blood disorder that left her at 99 pounds, undergoing 40 months of treatment and given only five years to live by doctors. She's known for her spontaneous dance performances, provocative artistic creations, fierce support of movements like BLMTO and #OccupyINAC and ongoing uplifting of young artists. Today, she is called Auntie Gloria by artists and activists across Toronto. Q&A As a black woman in Toronto, this artist felt invisible.so she turned it into her 'superpower'
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