🌔 “D E C O Y N E S T” by #SarahReneKraft (@sketchykraft) 2019 | 24” x 24” | Mixed-Media ——————————————— Created, mounted, and finished on gold-painted 2’x2’ wooden box panel for @broad_room’s #BroadSpectrum show in December of 2019. ——————————————— “I saw a crow building a nest, I was watching him very carefully, I was kind of stalking him and he was aware of it. And you know what they do when they become aware of someone stalking them when they build a nest, which is a very vulnerable place to be? They build a decoy nest. It's just for you.” —#TomWaits . I don’t know where to begin when talking about this piece. Like all my pieces in my #ribbonseries (a.k.a. “Lemniscus: The Ribbon Book”), I did not exactly know what it meant until it was done. These pieces speak from a primordial place for me. Like an ancient, dark fairytale they communicate through symbols and to the spirit from the shadow of my truest and deepest emotions. And often times the images that emerge appear as a blend of visual imagery from both childhood mythologies and as an unexpected expression of my traumas and constant journey toward mental wellness. . Truthfully, I’ve had this image (or at least something like it) rattling around in my brain since the start of the project in late 2015. Back then it meant something more personal and specific regarding my relationship with perceived rejection and chasing crumbs, even in friendships. . It’s interesting to me how much the essence of this piece has evolved and transformed from its manic roots to the complex and layered, yet simplified piece you see here. . The final result is still teaching me its secrets, but in addition to pulling symbols from my already established, incidental repeating visual metaphors, it follows the thread of attachment theory that was so carefully woven throughout the original series, highlighting the struggle of #FearfulAttachment—one of the 4 styles of adult attachment—in which a person greatly desires intimacy, but becomes anxious and fearful when the reality of emotional intimacy presents itself. ——————————————— #mentalhealthblogger #bipolarartist #tarotartist #fantasyillustration #symbolism (at Broad Room) https://www.instagram.com/p/B69nhf6J_kF/?igshid=8b0nqeowms7h