Social Distance

Created in the summer of 2021. This project was my way of describing the disillusionment of American society in the COVID pandemic as I experienced it. The statement below was written during the development of this project.

I am essentially expressing how I was experiencing the world in that very strange transitional period “post-COVID”

The project overview is a snapshot of this moment.

All throughout the pandemic, people had to adapt to the complexities of worldwide social distancing; leaving the physical world relatively empty. We were pushed into the digital space to fulfill many of our needs, and it cooped us up inside to reflect on our life choices.

For many of us, all of this rapid change illuminated the systemic problems we must deal with as a nation and clarified our values both as Americans and as humans. One example of an issue that was brought to light by the pandemic is the American people’s lack of access to scientifically accurate information. In the age of curated political culture wars and corporate engineering of social media echo-chambers, this reality is plain to see. Our growing digital existence - accelerated by COVID-19 - certainly adds complications to where we are headed as a species. In my view, COVID-1 9 has fundamentally changed who we are and how we live our lives.

With so many Americans vaccinated, new cases continuing to decline, and everyone feeling ready to leave all of this behind us, we have transitioned into a more “normal” state. Yet the world around us still feels different than it did before. People have changed as they’ve learned about the good, the bad, and the ugly of how we function as a society. It’s a very strange state to find ourselves in, many of us longing to return to the status-quo, yet there is an omnipresent feeling of instability in the air that’s here to stay.

This project does a good job of exemplifying why I am an advocate for “art therapy” and free expression broadly. I made this project at a very confusing and difficult time in my life, in many of our lives. At the time, I really couldn’t describe exactly what was wrong or how I felt, but what I could do was make these images. I knew they were expressing something significant to me, and it just felt really good to get it all out on the page. Over time, I grew to understand and be able to describe my emotions by just playing with them in this project.

Even if you don’t have an art practice, I feel it’s really helpful to always be making something. Do a journal entry every day, doodle, take weird pictures just with your phone. Self expression is inherently valuable!