Lorton Suffragette Series

These paintings were hung in the Lorton Arts Center Small Works Show over the holidays. The top painting was selected to be on the calendar they are going to print, hopefully before the end of the year. It's title is Metamorphosis, and intended to reflect the transition from prison to art center, to show that the physical structure, though the same, now houses a creative and positive spirit without completely forgetting the minds and bodies that once spent every waking moment behind those walls. My focus is mainly directed to those women imprisoned for standing up for equal rights. Seems so odd today that women were once not able to vote. Especially when a woman was so close to actually becoming the president, and is now the third female Secretary of State. So much can happen in so little time. The second photo is of eight paintings on the same subject, and again focusing on the suffragettes. Creating these pieces was an interesting process as I went online to find information on the women who were actually housed at the Lorton prison. These women were arrested for marching in Washington D.C. Many then refused to eat and were force fed with tubes and such. I also ran across political cartoons depicting the plight of the poor husbands of these activist women. One shows a man, the poor guy walks in the disheveled house where there is laundry everywhere and no dinner and he's tired after his day's work; and where, oh where, is his personal slave? Off galavanting around in front of the White House with her friends putting her nose where it doesn't belong. We've come a long way, at least in this country.