Visual Field

Visual Field looks at the body from above: the brain embroidered from MRI scans, the sitting figure fading to contours below. The MRI cuts through the eyes, the near-only gateway between the artist's body and the outside world. What the eyes see stays clear. Everything behind is layered under sheer voile, words and thoughts appliquéd discreetly within. The quilting ripples from the crown. The visual field holds still.

Visual Field is the second work in the 1:1 series, following Body Forensic. Where that piece read the body's surface for evidence of what had been done to it medically, this one turns inward.

The view is from above. I embroidered the brain from MRI scan images: the clinical, overhead gaze that knows the body by slicing through it. The sitting figure fades to contours below.

The MRI cuts through the eyes. For over 25 years, living with pain that was disbelieved and misdiagnosed, what my body felt couldn't be communicated. But what my eyes saw stayed clear. So the visual field is unworked: plain fabric, no layering, nothing over it.

Everything behind it is covered. Layer over layer of sheer polyester voile. Within those layers, words and thoughts are appliquéd and embroidered discreetly: half-hidden, present only on close looking. The quilting ripples from the crown outward. The front stays plain.

Two simultaneous states: the clarity of seeing and the opacity of feeling. Both were true for a long time.