Mindfulness and Jurying?

My monotype Genesis is in fact the genesis of my starting to work abstractly for the first time.  It is a joy when I feel the gestural freedom that is possible with monoprinting.  

At the Main Line Art Center's Members show recently, Genesis was awarded the Square One Award.  The Juror was Robert Cozzolino, Senior Curator and Curator of Modern Art at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.

A few weeks later, it was rejected by the juror for the Artists Equity Association members' exhibit at West Chester University.  What does this mean?

Mindfulness is accepting. It doesn’t label good or bad, right or wrong, beautiful or ugly. The moment is simply the moment.  A behavior is simply a behavior. No judgment.  

I think that means I can't take either event too personally.  But personally, I'm happy to have the prize.

Monopoly Revealed

"Toys: The Art of Play" is the title of the show my mixed media assemblage, Red, White, & Blue, will soon be part of at Main Line Art Center.  It was done on a Monopoly board over the summer, before the Occupy Movement began, but shares the zeitgeist that was in the air.  

 I'm curious to see the other juried work made from or inspired by toys.  I imagine a lot of it will be cute, funny, playful.  I can't say the same about my entry.  But I will say that it it was very satisfying for me to make it!  It felt good to include "Go To Jail" cards, bloodied hands, a headless falling child,  and of course the pig at the top. 

In Art and Fear, Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking, David Bayles and Ted Orland note "As a maker of art you are custodian of issues larger than self...In making art you declare what is important."  Sometimes we can't help ourselves.