SHOW NOTES:
0:00 artist & attorney Gina McKlveen
1:05 artist & retired judge Jerry Alonzo - the impact of depression
3:00 documentary American Symphony
3:50 Suleika Jaouad - release she experienced by painting about cancer
6:00 Alonzo’s “Out of Balance”
6:40 “Civic Sacrement"
8:20 woodwork during Alonzo’s time as a judge
9:00 “The Jury Box”
10:45 “The Judgment”
11:45 “Justice is God’s Plumb Line”
12:30 Environmental works like “Monstronse”
13:15 “Justice?”
14:15 “Passage”
14:40 “Faltering”
16:00 “Arc”
16:25 asylum work inspired “Matthew 25”
20:30 importance of leaning into the pain
21:35 Emily Gould’s comments
23:30 American Symphony - leaning into anxiety through art
26:25 McKlveen’s response to Alonzo’s work
26:45 “Upturned House” by Phyllida Barlow
27:20 “Inflated Balloons”
27:50 Carnegie International
28:40 McKlveen’s work leaning into grief and loss
29:35 “Fisherman on the Roof”
37:45 “Mermaid Mama”
39:25 “Stay Wild”
40:15 “Heather’s Mama”
42:00 McKlveen’s grandparents
44:50 portraiture versus still life works
47:00 other artists who created still life paintings as portraits, e.g., Van Gogh
48:30 Alonzo’s response to McKlveen
49:05 Gould’s response to McKlveen
49:45 Oluwatobi Aluko’s response
51:00 McKlveen’s planned portrait of grandmother with post box like Mona Lisa
Please share your comments and/or questions at stephanie@warfareofartandlaw.com
Music by Toulme.
To hear more episodes, please visit Warfare of Art and Law podcast's website.
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Thanks so much for listening!
© Stephanie Draw
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
I think Jerry spoke to this too of like getting
comfortable with theuncomfortable right is something
that is helpful in the arts andhaving conversations around
these hard subjects just as muchas it is in law right, because
we have really difficultconversations and real things
happen like that in the law aswell that we have to wrestle
with, and art and law are thetools that we get to use to have
(00:26):
a means to talk about these ina new and different way.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Welcome to Warfare of Art and Law, the podcast that
focuses on how justice does ordoesn't play out when art and
law overlap.
Hi everyone, it's Stephanie,and that was artist and attorney
Gina McLevine from a recentSecond Saturday Art and Justice
online gathering that wasfocused on the healing power of
(00:53):
art.
As Gina mentioned, retiredjudge and artist Jerry Alonzo
also joins us, beginning theconversation and sharing with us
what it means to him to lean into the negatives.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
The work I do is wood .
Wood sculpture used to befurniture.
This spring I think it's aroundMay I was prepping for a show,
a two-person show of my work andthe other person was a painter.
I was pretty anxious about it.
(01:28):
I don't know, you know I'vedone it before, but I was pretty
anxious about it and part of itwas, I think, that the prep for
the show hit at a period when aperiod of depression Depression
is not a new thing for me andthose of you who are who have
(01:52):
experienced it, know you can besomewhat debilitating, it stops
you and, frankly, it stopped mecold and this is something I've
had all of my life, most of mylife and I was stopped.
I had trouble even preppingexisting work I had already made
(02:15):
, but I also had intended somenew work and I just couldn't get
step one going on, that therewas not a creative thought in my
head and, frankly, I thought atthat point, after a few weeks
(02:35):
of this, saying I just can't dothis show.
I'm going to contact thegallery and say that's it.
No, thanks, take theconsequences of that.
Well, my wife Kate she talkedme out of it says no, come on,
give it a try, give it a try.
This is nothing new for you.
All, right, I said we'll giveit a try.
(02:57):
Right around that time wewatched a movie, a Netflix movie
, a documentary, called AmericanSymphony.
Some of you maybe some of youhave seen it.
If you haven't, I highlyrecommend it.
It's the story of John Batiste,a musician and composer, and
(03:22):
his wife Sulika.
John was looking to create theAmerican Symphony, which would
involve all sorts of things nottraditionally in a symphony
native instruments, drums, etc.
Etc.
And he traveled around to putthat all together.
(03:42):
Simultaneous with that, whilehe's traveling the country,
sulika has a relapse of hercancer.
She's in the hospital.
She also is an artist.
She's an author, a sellingauthor and a musician.
So all of her creative outletswere stopped.
(04:04):
She could do neither from whereshe was, with medications being
pumped into her regularly.
She's not a painter at all, butshe has someone to bring her in
some paints.
She was going to try something,try to get some creative
(04:28):
release, used the hospital bedtable as her easel and started
to learn how to paint.
The subject she chose to paintor maybe she didn't choose was
cancer.
She chose to paint, or maybeshe didn't choose was cancer,
(04:51):
her cancer and how it wasimpacting her, how she felt
about it, how messing upeverything in her life.
But she found a relief in that,a release in that.
That put a little light on that, put a little light on when.
I thought of that, when I heardthat and I saw her response to
it, I started thinking okay, sheis leaning into what is
(05:15):
troubling her.
She is leaning into her illness.
She is addressing her illnessas best she can given, laying in
a hospital bed with chemo goingall the time.
So I thought, is that somethingI can learn from?
Is that something I can do?
(05:37):
And so I thought about it andsaid how do I feel?
How do I feel right now?
At that time I feel out ofwhack, I feel out of balance, I
feel trapped, I feel I can't getout of where I am.
I came up with, and it didn'ttake too long, a very simple
(05:59):
piece.
A lot of the stuff is morecomplicated, but a very simple
piece that for me, said I'm outof balance, I'm locked in, the
key is out of reach and there itis.
There's me at this moment.
Sounds a little trite, maybe,but shortly after making that, a
(06:22):
little cloud started to lift, Ifelt better to where I could
start getting into rehab orprepping some of the existing
work.
I got that going and I stillhad a week or so left, so I was
then okay, can I get one piecein that?
(06:42):
I had in mind a new piecetitled Civic Sacrament.
It's a ballot box.
On all sides of it are words ofpeople whose words I respect.
The top one is Martin LutherKing, abraham Lincoln.
The title came from the wordsof Father Theodore Hesborough,
(07:05):
who was the president of NotreDame University, and his words
were voting is a civic sacrament.
You know, the politics of theworld is in my mind every day
and sometimes it knocks me downand I felt good about this piece
and I'm very messagey, but Itend to be messagey that's
(07:29):
nothing new for me, so that feltgood.
The show was frankly successful.
I sold a lot of work, stuckwith it, sometimes against my
better judgment, but it pannedout.
(07:51):
But where that led me next wasthe idea of this really this
leaning into the negative is.
That was a dramatic example forme, but it's something I then
thought about.
Well, you do that a lot, weprobably all do that a lot, and
(08:11):
the healing power, but I'd neverthought about it.
I'll give an example.
I was a judge.
I held trials, conducted trialsand some of them, you know, you
get to, you know high profile,get a little nervous about it,
(08:33):
anxiety, long before this trialis going to begin, go into my
studio and make something.
It made me feel better.
(08:53):
I felt that I was having someimpact on it and I could then go
in, go to work and do what Iwas going to do.
Example of that kind of workiselry Box.
That's the title of it.
I didn't have much time, so I'dmake a juror.
That would be it.
I'd get up in the morning andhere's a person that I saw
(09:16):
yesterday in voir dire.
I tried to be very respectfulabout all of them.
Respectful about all of them,but this was the reality.
The one in the back left.
She could not sit on this case.
(09:36):
She said and she's holding up.
It was a DWI with an accidentand injuries, and she said I
can't do that.
Well, why not?
Because I have a child?
Well, how does that impact you?
I have a child and it wouldjust frightens me to know that I
would be sitting in judgment ofsomeone who hurt somebody else.
(09:59):
Can't do it.
I went out, got out the clockis someone who's watching like
when's this thing going to beover?
This is boring.
Come on, get moving.
Second, in the back the greenone that's looking over your
shoulder I'll do what you'regoing to do.
What are you writing on yournotepad?
(10:20):
I'm going to copy that.
I could spend an hour or two andmake progress on this piece and
I was pretty pleased with it.
Then another kind of work I dida lot of, both as a practicing
attorney and as a judge familycourt.
That consumes huge amounts oftime.
(10:43):
That consumes huge amounts oftime and it was actually the one
I enjoyed the most and feltmost at ease and comfortable
with.
This piece is called Judgment.
I think I made it when it was ajuvenile delinquency case and
there's this kid facing thejudgment of others.
(11:03):
But then I found I couldmanipulate these pieces and they
could be very different and itwould be a whole different piece
.
It would be maybe a custodycase and the one parent
supporting the child, or aneglect case or an abuse case,
and that also helped me thinkthrough that kind of work.
(11:30):
I frequently, especially in thispolitical climate, feel that
sometimes the justice system's alittle out of whack.
A response to that is a piececalled Justice is God's Plum
Line.
If you know what a plum line is, it's a building tool.
(11:52):
You use it so that walls areplum.
The plumbob hangs there and youknow you open the door or you
touch it and it starts goingaround.
For me it was the idea thatthat will eventually recenter.
That's my optimism.
You know that I lost early inthis story, but you know, gain
(12:15):
back.
I'm an optimist.
Justice will work out.
Then, on environmental issues,which I'm concerned about, what
we are all doing to ourenvironment pieces called
monstrance, a vessel that wouldusually be exhibited in church,
(12:46):
that would have an object ofveneration in the center.
So I did one with a bird.
You know we're not payingenough attention to him.
I did another one with water,clean water.
We're not giving that adequateattention.
Same idea Monstrance.
H2o is the title of that, onePiece titled, and I made a bunch
(13:13):
of these Justice Question Mark,and when I put them out there I
offered them to people and saidyou know, here they are,
they're for sale and everydollar will go to legal aid.
I like interactivity.
And the question mark is youknow for lawyers and their
(13:39):
clients, how things go today foryou.
You know, was justice goingcooking for you or was it not
going too well?
Question mark.
And these fears became a wayfor me and others.
If they chose to say, okay, itwas a good day, good day for
(14:00):
justice, put the shiny brass oneup there, or not.
So good, leave the rusty one upthere and you know you can move
them back and forth.
Another peace passage.
I made it basically to show allright, we all got a rough time.
We got to go through whateverwe're going through here.
(14:22):
You got to get through thestones.
There's a little guide, but theboat gets there, navigates the
troubles, gets there eventually.
Maybe it gets a little bruisedalong the way.
There's a piece called Faltering.
It's about 36 inches tall, sixinches tall, and the words there
(14:43):
are.
You know that, words thatanybody who's studied law or
they're also just in commonusage justice is truth and
action.
It's Israeli Justice, ayearning for what is fine or
high I think that's Cardozo andso on.
Words that at various times inmy studies and in my career were
(15:06):
just very, they werecornerstones, they were just
important.
So I made this piece standingup.
I use the bird frequently as anobserver, just what's you know.
Let's keep an eye on things,let's see how it's going, and
then the flip side of that oneis it ain't going too well.
(15:27):
Altered fell down, but we'restill watching, and I got
magnets that I use.
I like interactivity, and sothis piece has the option of
going back up and I hope there'sa time when I feel very
(15:51):
comfortable about it standingback up proudly for all of us.
One more Arc A-R-C.
It's the words of Martin LutherKing Jr the arc of the moral
universe is long, but it bendstowards justice.
And this is bent, rusted steeland a lathe-turned bowl.
(16:16):
And the final one.
A couple of years ago I wentdown to the Texas-Mexican border
to work on asylum claims in thefamily detention centers in
Dilley and Carnes, texas.
I knew zero about this stuff,as did the others I traveled
(16:42):
with from Rochester, new York.
We did whatever law stuff wedid, and it wasn't immigration
and asylum.
We get down to Dilley andthere's the families, the local
lawyers, the Legal Aid Societybasically took charge of us in a
(17:02):
way that said okay, we'll getyou prepped here, we're going to
give you a day of here's howthis works.
Clients are going to come in.
They're going to be out of thelockup and coming in at a rapid
pace and you know, jerry, me,this is your, these are yours,
this is your family.
You're going to talk to themand I had someone who could help
(17:26):
me with translation, a Spanishspeaker who is now a lawyer in
North Carolina.
You would talk to the familiesand any questions we could go
out to the legal aid people whoare out there to help us out.
Say, ok, here's what I got.
What do you think what's next?
Help us out.
(17:48):
Say, okay, here's what I got.
What do you think what's next?
The first one was a young manwith his baby, his one or
two-year-old, laying on hischest.
He's probably mid-20s.
He spoke English, so we weretrained to ask what do you fear?
That was the asylum issue.
Why do you fear returning toyour home country?
(18:08):
And this young man said to melook at me, I'm homosexual.
Do you know what they do to mein Honduras?
I fear for my child's life moreso than I fear for my own.
(18:29):
So, anyway, saw many people.
We had a super group who reallygot into this and we prepared
people for their asylum claimsto at least be able to answer
with enough detail to be helpfulto them in there in front of
the hearing examiner.
(18:49):
So this piece is called Matthew25, and I don't remember the
exact words, but it involves youshall feed the hungry, house
the homeless, and this is againa plumb bob.
The words in the Bible would beclothe the naked, but I went
(19:10):
with the plumb bob.
So that's what I do, and thispiece was a response to how
anxious I felt during that twoweeks and I felt very good about
making this piece and I feltvery good about the experience I
had.
So that is my presentation.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
Thank you so much, Jerry, and I very much
appreciate your presentation andsharing all of this work and
the thoughts behind it.
I was just going to say Iappreciate your candor about how
you tapped into what you feltto be able to create this work.
I think that's such animportant part of the work of
(19:55):
any artist and you've just laidit out beautifully for us, and
also the fact that you evenpointed out that it helped you
through your work and I don'tthink that's true of just
lawyers, but certainly, I think,as lawyers and dealing with the
types of cases that you dealtwith in your work, lawyering and
then as a judge.
It was perhaps such a crucialpart of your personality that
(20:19):
you are an artist that you wereable to process it that way.
I would love to hear yourthoughts about that.
Speaker 3 (20:25):
Yes, for me it was, and as I got a little space
between myself and the trauma ofit, I discovered that that's
everybody's issue.
No matter what someone isfacing, that creates anxiety and
difficulty.
Lean into it were the words.
(20:48):
I came out of it.
Lean into it and chiding,moving the problem to the side
was not working for me at all.
I decided I just need toaddress it, and for me that was
making out of balance.
But for somebody else it'sdoing whatever they do to
(21:11):
express themselves writing, youknow writing, singing, you name
it.
So I learned a good lesson onthe healing power of art.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
We have a comment in the chat from Vince Proffey that
they love the interactivenature of your work, Jerry.
Speaker 5 (21:36):
Jerry, thank you.
It's Emily.
I just wanted to say thank youso much for sharing your story
with us all, because I thinkit's so important to talk about
these things and to share thesekinds of coping mechanisms, and
I think you know, these arethings that maybe people you
(21:58):
know years ago probably wouldn'thave raised, wouldn't have
talked about, wouldn't have beenso open about.
I think it's so helpful toother people that we have these
conversations now and, um, it'sreally inspiring.
Your story is really, as is yourart, of course, and I wanted to
ask you whether, when you sortof started to lean into those
(22:25):
feelings you were having throughdoing your work and expressing,
I guess, your feelings andmaybe the depression, the
anxiety in that way, was it sortof an intuitive feeling that
you knew that would make youfeel better, or it was more of a
kind of intellectual processwhereby you thought, okay, I
(22:46):
have to make myself do thisbecause I know it will be
helpful to me.
Or was it more of a, like I say, more of an intuitive feeling
that you did the work and thenmaybe the realization came later
that actually that was aprocess that was really helpful.
So then you sort of would sayto yourself okay, I'm feeling
like this, so I need to do thework.
Maybe it's not something thatyou know intuitively, I just
(23:11):
would go to do, but I know thatif I push myself to do it I will
feel better.
I don't know if that made sense.
No, I got you.
Speaker 3 (23:20):
No, it wasn't intuitive, because it didn't.
What was it?
It was watching Sulika do thatwith her cancer, and I had never
seen, I had never thought aboutthat before.
And this I'm talking about afilm.
(23:40):
You could watch it tonight.
It just was, oh, she's got theworst thing in the world going
on.
She's near death and she'sgoing to paint how she feels.
And she doesn't paint.
So no, it was strictly.
She delivered me a gift and Isaid, well, let me try, and it
(24:08):
was.
It worked for me.
It worked for me.
I leaned into what I do.
Speaker 5 (24:16):
Yeah, amazing and that is an amazing film.
I kind of came upon it bychance, but it's really, yeah,
it is very inspiring and it kindof stays with you.
Yeah, I would recommend gettingto watch it.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
Yeah, and I was just going to say it's interesting
because you've shared with usthese pieces that you had made
prior to that, I believe and thefact that you had already had
that experience with processingyour uh, feelings and your
anxiety through your art, andthat it would take something
(24:55):
else, like an external stimulus,like the film, to be able to
help you link that in for thiscurrent challenge with the last
show.
Speaker 3 (25:05):
Well, I wasn't aware that I was doing it.
That was part of the light.
I never thought consciouslythat when I'd get up in the
morning nervous about my day aseverybody is, whatever their day
may be that going into mystudio and making a juror was
(25:27):
leaning into anxiety.
It was making a juror, it was.
It put a smile on my face and,and you know so, no it it.
And so the end of that storywas that I looked back and said,
oh, I have been doing this.
I never thought about it.
(25:48):
Maybe I was a little deeper inthe weeds on this one that I'm,
you know, my example I'm usingfor the show, but you know I
think we all, we all do it invarious ways.
So I thank you all for yourquestions and comments and glad
(26:11):
to be here.
Speaker 2 (26:12):
Thank you so much.
So we will turn to GinaMcLeveen, who is going to share
her experience having differentaspects of creating paintings
about loss and grief.
Gina.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
I can't begin without also just kind of praising
Jerry and that presentation abit before of just how moving it
really is your artwork and alsoyour message-y-ness.
I'm glad that it is that Iwanted the first piece that you
brought up.
I don't know if you're familiarwith this artist, jerry, but
her name is Phil.
(26:47):
I think it's a Filda Barlow.
She had a piece that was in theCarnegie International.
She had a piece that was in theCarnegie International which is
held in Pittsburgh.
It's called Upturned House.
I saw it when I like the senioryear of high school or something
like that and it was reallyreally moving.
It has a similar upturnedunbalancedness to it.
So I would really recommend yousee that work at some point.
(27:10):
You see that work at some pointand on that um, I think that
your work so much of um, eventhe the faltering with the
justice falling down.
It reminded me of another pieceI saw at the carnegie
international.
It was inflated balloons, um,and the balloons inflated
balloons yeah, with likedifferent letters and they
spelled out various acts of aninternational law.
(27:32):
That's not coming into mindright now, but it was a human
rights law and the internationallasts like several months, so
over time these balloons wouldobviously lose their air and
kind of collapse.
Um, and as I'm referencingthese pieces, I'm just like
jerry has this quality that,like you, should apply to the
carnegie international if youwant it um, your work is amazing
(27:53):
.
I love the materials that youuse.
Both my grandfathers arewoodworkers.
My late grandfather would maketoys for us as kids and he'd
always bring those out, so itwas a sweet presentation that
you gave.
I also resonate personally withthe jury box.
I just stepped into aprosecutorial role so I have
(28:17):
obviously a lot of interactionswith jury members coming up and
I think that is a reallyprecious illustration of jurors.
I tend to focus more onrealistic representation, so I
love like seeing people in anabstract sense.
That was really really welldone, so thank you?
Yeah, absolutely so.
(28:39):
My work, as I said, and similarto Jerry's, it's this leaning
in aspect to the negative andthe hard and the heavy.
For me, it's a lot around griefand loss.
For me, it's a lot around griefand loss, which seems to have
been a pattern that I didn'trealize a lot until I started
(29:00):
taking a look at the experiencespeople were telling me about or
the works that I was creating.
It was almost like we weretalking about a natural kind of
reaction to when I was hurting.
I would grab my paint brushesand I'd go downstairs and I'd
just, you know, paint what I wasfeeling, and that had a way of,
you know, letting the hardstuff roll off and turning the
(29:23):
really negative emotions intosomething I could step back and
be like wow, that's reallybeautiful.
A piece that I did.
It's called Fisherman on theRoof.
A piece that I did.
(29:48):
It's called Fisherman on theRoof.
This is a piece that I createdon a wood panel and my family
live in Pennsylvania and so Ididn't have a car down in DC, so
my dad would often drive andpick me up and in the summers we
would stop at this orchard onour way down to DC and get fresh
peaches and it was a family runfarm and that sort of thing.
(30:10):
So the year of 2021, which wasthe same year that I graduated
from law school we turned intothe farm, like we did the past
two years our annual little tripand I saw that they had like a
grad sign, like congratulations2021, grad sign, and I made a
mental note to you know, askabout that when I, when we got
to the you know the peaches andthe checkout line and things, so
(30:34):
we were the only ones in there.
It was early morning.
My dad picked up his peachesand I'm looking around at the
it's basically a garage wherethey sell everything out of our
barn and they had pictures oflike little kids on the walls
and so I just quipped, I waslike which one of these is the
college graduate?
And the older woman at the cashregister just goes completely
(30:57):
silent.
And I have that oh no, whathave I done?
Kind of moment.
You know, like what did I?
What did I say?
And then she proceeds to tellme that he had passed away, he
did not finish his graduationyear, but they still put the
sign up for him.
He was involved in a caraccident Obviously not what I
(31:19):
was expecting to hear at all Wasreally moved by not only his
legacy that she was relaying tous, but also the way that she
was handling it, because it wasstill very fresh.
We were there in June.
I think the accident had takenplace a few weeks even prior to
that.
So, everything being reallyfresh, and I walked away from
(31:42):
that interaction being like, oh,I didn't even ask his name,
like that was, that would havebeen the simplest way to try to
figure out, or like remember theperson, try to figure out, or
like remember the person.
So I'm driving out the driveway, dad has his peaches and things
and I'm just like, oh, whatcould his name be?
And for whatever reason,alexander came to mind.
(32:03):
So I kept that in my mind thewhole way we're driving back to
DC.
And the second my dad dropped meoff at my apartment.
I started doing Google searchesfrom the area we were in, the
name Alexander.
I eventually find his obituaryand the individual's name was
Kai Alexander Burkett.
He wasn't.
He was 17 years old, I believeat the time of the accident, a
(32:27):
wrestler.
He had so much ahead of him.
And in that reading all of thatand just that entire
interaction.
A week later I call back to theorchard and I say Hi, I don't
know if you're going to rememberme had the conversation with
the same woman I had a weekprior and I said Can I do a
painting for your family?
Almost as a way of like, anoffering, like I, I just really
(32:50):
feel I need to do this.
I was like I don't know howlong it's going to take.
Do you have any specificrequests?
Things like that.
They had no requests, they werejust honored that I even, you
know, was offering this to them.
So, again, I had just graduated,so I was in the middle of
figuring out my own life.
(33:10):
I carded this two feet by fourfeet board with me everywhere I
went.
I moved back to Pennsylvania, Iwas studying for the bar exam
and so on my time from studyingfor the bar.
When I wasn't studying for thebar, I was down making a mess of
this painting.
I eventually finished it aroundthe time that I was headed to
(33:30):
Maryland where I sat for my barexam.
So along the way, obviously thatwas July, so it was peach
season all over again.
So I was like dad he was, hewent with me, thankfully, had
some moral support for the barexam as well.
So we piled up in the car againand we drove down to the
orchard on our way to Baltimorewhere I was taking the bar exam.
(33:54):
And we get to the orchard, dadgets out and gets his peaches.
I'm carrying this big canvas upto our wood panel, up to the
same barn we were in about ayear prior, and the same woman
was there and I was like I don'tknow if you're going to
remember me, but here's the andI'm crying.
She's crying um, and she askedme she's like, can I give this
(34:17):
to my daughter, which would havebeen Kai's mom?
Um, and I said, of course, dowith it whatever you want, um,
around Christmas of that year.
Well, actually, um, carry on,go take the bar exam.
I remember my dad asking likeyou know, are you nervous about
the bar exam?
And I was.
My dad asking like you know,are you nervous about the bar
exam?
And I was like, dad, honestly,I could care less about an exam
(34:39):
like that.
What we just did, like that'swhat I want to do, you know,
like, whatever it is law, art,like that feeling, that's all I.
That's like what I'm chasingright moments like that.
And so, again, like in Decemberof that year, I got a message
from Kai's mom saying that, witha picture of this painting hung
(35:01):
up in the new edition of theirhouse, she was really struggling
at the time with his death andalso, when this painting arrived
, of changing the house at all.
That's something that happens alot in grief, like when you
lose someone, you wanteverything to stay the same.
You don't want, um, you want toleave things the way they were
when that person was around.
So, um, she was like gettingthat painting was like
(35:24):
confirmation for her to likemove forward with this building
projects on their house.
So, um, sorry, uh, kai and thispainting is in their family
room.
They had seven kids.
Kai was the second oldest, sohe had an older brother.
Each of these waves depict thechildren of the family this pond
(35:56):
.
Because he had an EternityOutdoors channel.
He was super into the outdoorsand I watched through the videos
just trying to study like whowas this kid, who is this person
?
And there was this one video ofhim grabbing a lawn chair on
his parents' roof and fishingoff into the pond, and he had an
umbrella, originally attachedto the chair, and then the wind
kept blowing the umbrella.
So he goes inside and grabs thesombrero and I'm like, I feel
(36:18):
like this is the only like thiscould be the only kid that
thought to do this and I thoughtthat would be a beautiful way
to capture him and who he was.
The lanterns off to the sidethey did a memorial of the
service you know in his honorand so this is kind of depicting
that.
All the people that would haveknown and loved him standing
(36:38):
around this pool that he'sfishing into obviously the
orchard, the peaches of how Iknow and understand the family
yeah, that was.
This is the story of Kai.
I, my dad, just went and gotpeaches last month or two months
ago.
I guess at this point I'mlosing track of time, but yeah,
(36:59):
they're a special family.
He was clearly a special personand this piece obviously holds
a really big place in my heartbecause of just who they are and
who he was.
Around the same time, in thislaw school slash, becoming a
licensed attorney time frame, Ihad several again, just several
(37:20):
stories of either friends orclassmates just telling me about
their loss.
I don't know what is.
I joke sometimes where I shouldhave like trauma just tattooed
on my forehead because, forwhatever reason, people are,
just, they share with me somereally difficult experiences and
I treat that very delicatelyand as a super big honor and
(37:42):
privilege and a purpose.
Honestly, this first piece,mermaid mama I call her my law
school classmate our 2l yearlost her to cancer.
I can't imagine going through Iknow everyone always says that
right, I can't imagine.
I can't imagine.
But truly on top of a pandemicand everything else, just going
(38:05):
to law school is difficult,right, anyone in that time is
incredibly hard.
She dealt with it and I wouldhave been a mess.
She was, she's much strongerthan I am.
(38:25):
But she asked at our graduationif I would paint a picture of
her mom, which I did.
I had met her mom our 1L year,so this was a very difficult
piece.
It was kind of the first timesomeone formally asked me to
paint someone who they lost andit had a huge responsibility
attached to it, right, not onlybecause I met her mom, but also
(38:45):
this was our chance to preservesome of who she was for my law
school classmate.
I struggled a lot personally indoing it.
You know, constantly kind ofasking myself, asking her mom
right, like, should I put thiscolor here.
What about this, you know?
Should I incorporate this?
My law school classmate hadgiven me she knew she wanted her
(39:11):
in like a Lily Pulitzer styledress because she wore those all
the time.
She loved mermaids.
They would vacation to Hawaiitogether all the time.
So that was the essence of ofthat piece.
Then a law school professor hadtold me the story about her mom,
who also tragically died whileshe was in law school, who,
(39:33):
after she had given one of hermock or moot court competition
arguments when she was a lawstudent, her mom had given her a
dozen roses with underwear,lingerie in it and a note that
said stay wild.
And as my law professor wastelling me this story, you know
(39:54):
she was clearly moved by it andI wanted to create a painting
for her to help remember her mom.
So this hangs in her office asa way to, you know, remember her
mom as well.
All of these pieces were puttogether, probably in a matter
of four months, I would say so.
(40:14):
The last instance was a friendfrom Pennsylvania had lost her
mom as well and immediatelytexted me in the same breath,
almost.
You know, mom passed away.
Would you create a painting ofher and this one?
I had never met her mother, soit was a much different
(40:35):
experience.
I had never even really seenher mom, so this was the first
time I was seeing her and Icaught the resemblance of how
much she looked like my friend,and this was one of her last,
probably portraits taken.
It was at her my friend's son'swedding that this picture was
(40:57):
depicted and based off of.
Again, just a way, almost likean offering, like someone brings
a, you know, a dish to someoneafter a funeral or something
like that a hot dish.
I felt like this piece was myoffering where I traveled back
to Pennsylvania I was still inDC at the time and you know
expressing my condolences forthe loss of her mom.
(41:18):
And, yeah, this was my again,just something I treat as my
gift, my offering to people whohave experienced loss and
entering into that grief withthem, to the point that I might
not personally have experiencedthe loss, but it's almost like
that vicarious grief to use kindof the legal term where you're
(41:42):
going through the motions withand alongside them, helping them
carry the burden of whatthey've gone.
And then, lastly, I will sharewith you all some of my grief.
So these are images of mygrandparents.
(42:07):
My paternal grandparents areboth now deceased and my
maternal grandparents are,thankfully, still with us.
Last year they celebrated their70th wedding anniversary.
I created this painting forthat event.
I had known for a while that Iwanted to create portraits of
(42:28):
them.
I'm the youngest of all thegrandkids, so I always feel a
bit uh, shorted on time withthem, uh, whereas my older
cousins have kind of gone aboutand had their lives and their
kids and their homes and havesettled I am a few years behind,
we'll say so um, my wanting tocreate these portraits of them
(42:52):
was my way of preserving themfor the people who will enter
into my life that won't get tomeet them personally.
I have visions of these piecesin my home someday and can point
out to my kids and explain andtell them stories about my
grandparents.
And I found in this process I'llsay specifically for my
(43:14):
paternal grandfather here hepassed away when, um, I was
still in high school it was thesummer before my uh senior year
and in creating this uh piece alittle over 10 years later, um,
it was really hard to recall hisface, um, his resemblance,
(43:35):
resemblance, and I struggled abit.
I relied on my older brotherfor critiques and helping me
re-remember what my grandparentor grandfather looked like,
whereas the others who werestill living at the time, I was
much more able to recall howthey looked and able to capture
(43:55):
their resemblances a bit moreeasily and naturally.
So that's a bit of myexperience with painting through
grief and loss.
It's a theme I feel like I'mexploring constantly.
It's work that I enjoy doing.
(44:17):
I think it's an emotional laborof love and care and
responsibility, preserving whopeople are for the people who
love them, and it helps mepersonally, like I said, in
dealing with the the grief andgiving it space to breathe
(44:38):
through paint and storytellingand things like that.
Speaker 2 (44:43):
Thank you so much, Gina.
I also wanted to just follow upon a couple of points that
you've raised in the articlethat you wrote, as well as here
the idea of doing portraitureversus a still life to honor the
memory of someone.
Could you speak to that?
Speaker 1 (45:04):
so, um, the pieces I created, uh, as soon as my
paternal grandfather died, um, Ihad done a charcoal drawing of
boots with crumpled up pieces ofmoney around them.
It was a phrase my grandfatherwould use all the time.
He would say bet your boots.
And then another piece I did,again almost immediately
(45:26):
following his death, was layingin the grass, there was a Bible,
one of the wood figures that hehad created.
This was an acrylic paintingand then a picture of us from
one of his birthdays.
So it's me, super young, andhim like blowing out candles on
a cake.
And I realized, looking back,how, in the moment, after my own
(45:54):
grief, I really struggled with,you know, grief, I really
struggled with, you know,dealing with the loss of my
grandfather and almost likedepicting his person immediately
for my own sake.
So how I dealt with it wasthrough the things he left
behind, the moments I rememberedabout him that I didn't want to
forget, like the things he saidor the things that he loved to
(46:18):
do.
It was my inability to kind offace that he was gone and, like
I said, it took me about 10years, a little over 10 years,
to finally create a paintingwith his actual portrait and in
that time I realized I forgot abit about how he looked.
I had to rely on photographsthat I couldn't paint him from
(46:40):
life.
I couldn't.
It shocked me honestly how muchof him I had forgotten.
So creating the still lifeimmediately were again just my
inability to face the fact thathe was gone.
It was the only thing,creatively, I could muster up to
kind of deal with him no longerbeing here and not seeing him
(47:00):
anymore.
Speaker 2 (47:05):
And I appreciate it so much that you were I'm not
sure if you were looking for itintentionally or just found it
when you were doing the article,but looking back at other
artists who had done the samething.
Speaker 1 (47:16):
Yeah, so I had learned that I was on some sort
of museum tour, I think in theNational Gallery of Art, and the
docent had pointed that outthat this was a portrait that
Van Gogh had done to honor hisfather.
It was similarly to books inthe Bible, just depicting maybe
(47:39):
similarly how Van Gogh may havefelt with the loss of his father
, that inability to kind of justface the fact that they are
gone and really just looking atthe things they leave behind,
because in the end, when they'regone, that's all we have.
Yeah, it was really striking tome as well finding that and was
(48:01):
a way other artists who havecome, you know way before me
have have dealt with grief andthe loss of someone.
They love.
Speaker 2 (48:10):
Yeah, yeah.
Thank you so much for sharingall of the work and your process
and and your experiencecreating that work.
Does anyone have any questionsor comments that they'd want to
share about what Gina hasoffered?
Speaker 3 (48:28):
I just want to say that the work is beautiful.
The story is powerful.
I got tears in my eyes, gina.
I got tears in my eyes, gina.
You're hitting it on a lot ofdirections.
Yourself, you are helpingyourself heal and you're helping
(48:50):
a lot of people heal the motherof I, the family, et cetera, et
cetera.
That's beautiful.
Speaker 5 (49:02):
Thank you.
Yeah, I was going to sayexactly the same.
Gina.
Thank you so much for sharingthat story and all of your
beautiful, beautiful work.
And, yeah, such beautifulstories and so very generous,
gina.
So generous because doing thoseworks I know you were saying
you know it helped you as well,but that's such a massive sort
(49:24):
of emotional investment and youdidn't know that family with the
peaches and wow, and you becamepart of their lives, they
became a big part of your lifeover all of that time and, um,
yes, amazing, gina, reallyamazing thank you yeah, hi, gina
(49:44):
, I don't know what to say.
Speaker 4 (49:46):
Like I haven't like looked at art from this
perspective before.
Like I know that you could.
You can use art to expressgrief, but having someone like
do it and I'm looking andlistening this is the first time
that I'm seeing this kind ofart done live.
This is the first time I'mexperiencing this.
(50:07):
And this is so powerful becauserecently a friend of mine lost
a dad and we've been talkingabout it.
The burial is a few weeks andit's, it's just like, it's so
beautiful, like what you'redoing is so beautiful, it's so
powerful, I think.
Well, that's all I have to say.
Like it's, it's powerful thankyou.
Speaker 1 (50:31):
Yeah, I am right there with you.
I also, um, I lost my maternalgrandma uh, about two months ago
now, at this point, and it was.
I'll save a lot of the details,but I was in Paris and the day
before I left I went to theLouvre and I saw the Mona Lisa
for the first time, and a fewyears ago I thought about I
(50:55):
wanted to do a painting of mygrandma.
It's similar to like a MonaLisa, but just in the fact I
don't know if anyone knows thisthe Mona Lisa has her own
mailbox and I love that factabout her.
I love that people can writeher notes and my grandma was
someone who, all through lawschool, always wrote me letters
and notes and things like that.
(51:16):
So I have this vision ofcreating a portrait of my
grandma.
I hope it doesn't take me 10years, like it did my
grandfather, where I will have aportrait just of her, with some
sort of mailbox where peoplecan come and write letters,
offer I don't know what, maybelike it's a way of them to deal
(51:37):
with their own losses andparting words that maybe they
didn't get, um the the backendof then that story.
So I saw the Mona Lisa, andthen I traveled home and my
flight was going to be delayedand I called my dad and my
brother.
I was, like, can you come getme?
Like I really just want to behome, um, and so they do they.
They pick me up at the airport.
That was much further than myoriginal, you know, ending
(52:00):
destination was supposed to be,and on the way home dad told me
that you know, grandma might notbe there when we get back.
So we drive across the state andthe next morning I went and see
my grandma and the firstquestion she asked me was how
was your trip?
And like she is, she's on herway out, like very clearly, um,
(52:25):
and I just think more people, uh, talking about.
You know their losses and theirgrief and dealing with it,
whether with however they needto.
Um is really important, um, andshe did not make it past that
day, uh, and so I want to beable to honor her through my art
making process just as much,whether it's through writing,
like jerry was saying, whetherit was through, um, you know,
creating a movie, creating adance, creating wood sculptures,
(52:48):
creating whatever it is, if youcan partner with someone when
they're going through reallydifficult things through art, it
really, like I can tell you, itchanges people's lives.
You'll change your outlook asan artist and it's yeah, it's an
honor to be able to step intothose kinds of things and
feelings with people there willbe links in the show notes to
(53:12):
learn more.
Speaker 2 (53:14):
if you were intrigued by this podcast, it would be
much appreciated if you couldleave a rating, a review and tag
Warfare of Art and Law podcast.
Until next time, this isStephanie Drotty bringing you
Warfare of Art and Law.
Thank you so much for listeningand remember injustice anywhere
is a threat to justiceeverywhere.
I think Jerry spoke to this too of like getting
comfortable with theuncomfortable right is something
that is helpful in the arts andhaving conversations around
these hard subjects just as muchas it is in law right, because
we have really difficultconversations and real things
happen like that in the law aswell that we have to wrestle
with, and art and law are thetools that we get to use to have
(00:26):
a means to talk about these ina new and different way.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Welcome to Warfare of Art and Law, the podcast that
focuses on how justice does ordoesn't play out when art and
law overlap.
Hi everyone, it's Stephanie,and that was artist and attorney
Gina McLevine from a recentSecond Saturday Art and Justice
online gathering that wasfocused on the healing power of
(00:53):
art.
As Gina mentioned, retiredjudge and artist Jerry Alonzo
also joins us, beginning theconversation and sharing with us
what it means to him to lean into the negatives.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
The work I do is wood .
Wood sculpture used to befurniture.
This spring I think it's aroundMay I was prepping for a show,
a two-person show of my work andthe other person was a painter.
I was pretty anxious about it.
(01:28):
I don't know, you know I'vedone it before, but I was pretty
anxious about it and part of itwas, I think, that the prep for
the show hit at a period when aperiod of depression Depression
is not a new thing for me andthose of you who are who have
(01:52):
experienced it, know you can besomewhat debilitating, it stops
you and, frankly, it stopped mecold and this is something I've
had all of my life, most of mylife and I was stopped.
I had trouble even preppingexisting work I had already made
(02:15):
, but I also had intended somenew work and I just couldn't get
step one going on, that therewas not a creative thought in my
head and, frankly, I thought atthat point, after a few weeks
(02:35):
of this, saying I just can't dothis show.
I'm going to contact thegallery and say that's it.
No, thanks, take theconsequences of that.
Well, my wife Kate she talkedme out of it says no, come on,
give it a try, give it a try.
This is nothing new for you.
All, right, I said we'll giveit a try.
(02:57):
Right around that time wewatched a movie, a Netflix movie
, a documentary, called AmericanSymphony.
Some of you maybe some of youhave seen it.
If you haven't, I highlyrecommend it.
It's the story of John Batiste,a musician and composer, and
(03:22):
his wife Sulika.
John was looking to create theAmerican Symphony, which would
involve all sorts of things nottraditionally in a symphony
native instruments, drums, etc.
Etc.
And he traveled around to putthat all together.
(03:42):
Simultaneous with that, whilehe's traveling the country,
sulika has a relapse of hercancer.
She's in the hospital.
She also is an artist.
She's an author, a sellingauthor and a musician.
So all of her creative outletswere stopped.
(04:04):
She could do neither from whereshe was, with medications being
pumped into her regularly.
She's not a painter at all, butshe has someone to bring her in
some paints.
She was going to try something,try to get some creative
(04:28):
release, used the hospital bedtable as her easel and started
to learn how to paint.
The subject she chose to paintor maybe she didn't choose was
cancer.
She chose to paint, or maybeshe didn't choose was cancer,
(04:51):
her cancer and how it wasimpacting her, how she felt
about it, how messing upeverything in her life.
But she found a relief in that,a release in that.
That put a little light on that, put a little light on when.
I thought of that, when I heardthat and I saw her response to
it, I started thinking okay, sheis leaning into what is
(05:15):
troubling her.
She is leaning into her illness.
She is addressing her illnessas best she can given, laying in
a hospital bed with chemo goingall the time.
So I thought, is that somethingI can learn from?
Is that something I can do?
(05:37):
And so I thought about it andsaid how do I feel?
How do I feel right now?
At that time I feel out ofwhack, I feel out of balance, I
feel trapped, I feel I can't getout of where I am.
I came up with, and it didn'ttake too long, a very simple
(05:59):
piece.
A lot of the stuff is morecomplicated, but a very simple
piece that for me, said I'm outof balance, I'm locked in, the
key is out of reach and there itis.
There's me at this moment.
Sounds a little trite, maybe,but shortly after making that, a
(06:22):
little cloud started to lift, Ifelt better to where I could
start getting into rehab orprepping some of the existing
work.
I got that going and I stillhad a week or so left, so I was
then okay, can I get one piecein that?
(06:42):
I had in mind a new piecetitled Civic Sacrament.
It's a ballot box.
On all sides of it are words ofpeople whose words I respect.
The top one is Martin LutherKing, abraham Lincoln.
The title came from the wordsof Father Theodore Hesborough,
(07:05):
who was the president of NotreDame University, and his words
were voting is a civic sacrament.
You know, the politics of theworld is in my mind every day
and sometimes it knocks me downand I felt good about this piece
and I'm very messagey, but Itend to be messagey that's
(07:29):
nothing new for me, so that feltgood.
The show was frankly successful.
I sold a lot of work, stuckwith it, sometimes against my
better judgment, but it pannedout.
(07:51):
But where that led me next wasthe idea of this really this
leaning into the negative is.
That was a dramatic example forme, but it's something I then
thought about.
Well, you do that a lot, weprobably all do that a lot, and
(08:11):
the healing power, but I'd neverthought about it.
I'll give an example.
I was a judge.
I held trials, conducted trialsand some of them, you know, you
get to, you know high profile,get a little nervous about it,
(08:33):
anxiety, long before this trialis going to begin, go into my
studio and make something.
It made me feel better.
(08:53):
I felt that I was having someimpact on it and I could then go
in, go to work and do what Iwas going to do.
Example of that kind of workiselry Box.
That's the title of it.
I didn't have much time, so I'dmake a juror.
That would be it.
I'd get up in the morning andhere's a person that I saw
(09:16):
yesterday in voir dire.
I tried to be very respectfulabout all of them.
Respectful about all of them,but this was the reality.
The one in the back left.
She could not sit on this case.
(09:36):
She said and she's holding up.
It was a DWI with an accidentand injuries, and she said I
can't do that.
Well, why not?
Because I have a child?
Well, how does that impact you?
I have a child and it wouldjust frightens me to know that I
would be sitting in judgment ofsomeone who hurt somebody else.
(09:59):
Can't do it.
I went out, got out the clockis someone who's watching like
when's this thing going to beover?
This is boring.
Come on, get moving.
Second, in the back the greenone that's looking over your
shoulder I'll do what you'regoing to do.
What are you writing on yournotepad?
(10:20):
I'm going to copy that.
I could spend an hour or two andmake progress on this piece and
I was pretty pleased with it.
Then another kind of work I dida lot of, both as a practicing
attorney and as a judge familycourt.
That consumes huge amounts oftime.
(10:43):
That consumes huge amounts oftime and it was actually the one
I enjoyed the most and feltmost at ease and comfortable
with.
This piece is called Judgment.
I think I made it when it was ajuvenile delinquency case and
there's this kid facing thejudgment of others.
(11:03):
But then I found I couldmanipulate these pieces and they
could be very different and itwould be a whole different piece
.
It would be maybe a custodycase and the one parent
supporting the child, or aneglect case or an abuse case,
and that also helped me thinkthrough that kind of work.
(11:30):
I frequently, especially in thispolitical climate, feel that
sometimes the justice system's alittle out of whack.
A response to that is a piececalled Justice is God's Plum
Line.
If you know what a plum line is, it's a building tool.
(11:52):
You use it so that walls areplum.
The plumbob hangs there and youknow you open the door or you
touch it and it starts goingaround.
For me it was the idea thatthat will eventually recenter.
That's my optimism.
You know that I lost early inthis story, but you know, gain
(12:15):
back.
I'm an optimist.
Justice will work out.
Then, on environmental issues,which I'm concerned about, what
we are all doing to ourenvironment pieces called
monstrance, a vessel that wouldusually be exhibited in church,
(12:46):
that would have an object ofveneration in the center.
So I did one with a bird.
You know we're not payingenough attention to him.
I did another one with water,clean water.
We're not giving that adequateattention.
Same idea Monstrance.
H2o is the title of that, onePiece titled, and I made a bunch
(13:13):
of these Justice Question Mark,and when I put them out there I
offered them to people and saidyou know, here they are,
they're for sale and everydollar will go to legal aid.
I like interactivity.
And the question mark is youknow for lawyers and their
(13:39):
clients, how things go today foryou.
You know, was justice goingcooking for you or was it not
going too well?
Question mark.
And these fears became a wayfor me and others.
If they chose to say, okay, itwas a good day, good day for
(14:00):
justice, put the shiny brass oneup there, or not.
So good, leave the rusty one upthere and you know you can move
them back and forth.
Another peace passage.
I made it basically to show allright, we all got a rough time.
We got to go through whateverwe're going through here.
(14:22):
You got to get through thestones.
There's a little guide, but theboat gets there, navigates the
troubles, gets there eventually.
Maybe it gets a little bruisedalong the way.
There's a piece called Faltering.
It's about 36 inches tall, sixinches tall, and the words there
(14:43):
are.
You know that, words thatanybody who's studied law or
they're also just in commonusage justice is truth and
action.
It's Israeli Justice, ayearning for what is fine or
high I think that's Cardozo andso on.
Words that at various times inmy studies and in my career were
(15:06):
just very, they werecornerstones, they were just
important.
So I made this piece standingup.
I use the bird frequently as anobserver, just what's you know.
Let's keep an eye on things,let's see how it's going, and
then the flip side of that oneis it ain't going too well.
(15:27):
Altered fell down, but we'restill watching, and I got
magnets that I use.
I like interactivity, and sothis piece has the option of
going back up and I hope there'sa time when I feel very
(15:51):
comfortable about it standingback up proudly for all of us.
One more Arc A-R-C.
It's the words of Martin LutherKing Jr the arc of the moral
universe is long, but it bendstowards justice.
And this is bent, rusted steeland a lathe-turned bowl.
(16:16):
And the final one.
A couple of years ago I wentdown to the Texas-Mexican border
to work on asylum claims in thefamily detention centers in
Dilley and Carnes, texas.
I knew zero about this stuff,as did the others I traveled
(16:42):
with from Rochester, new York.
We did whatever law stuff wedid, and it wasn't immigration
and asylum.
We get down to Dilley andthere's the families, the local
lawyers, the Legal Aid Societybasically took charge of us in a
(17:02):
way that said okay, we'll getyou prepped here, we're going to
give you a day of here's howthis works.
Clients are going to come in.
They're going to be out of thelockup and coming in at a rapid
pace and you know, jerry, me,this is your, these are yours,
this is your family.
You're going to talk to themand I had someone who could help
(17:26):
me with translation, a Spanishspeaker who is now a lawyer in
North Carolina.
You would talk to the familiesand any questions we could go
out to the legal aid people whoare out there to help us out.
Say, ok, here's what I got.
What do you think what's next?
Help us out.
(17:48):
Say, okay, here's what I got.
What do you think what's next?
The first one was a young manwith his baby, his one or
two-year-old, laying on hischest.
He's probably mid-20s.
He spoke English, so we weretrained to ask what do you fear?
That was the asylum issue.
Why do you fear returning toyour home country?
(18:08):
And this young man said to melook at me, I'm homosexual.
Do you know what they do to mein Honduras?
I fear for my child's life moreso than I fear for my own.
(18:29):
So, anyway, saw many people.
We had a super group who reallygot into this and we prepared
people for their asylum claimsto at least be able to answer
with enough detail to be helpfulto them in there in front of
the hearing examiner.
(18:49):
So this piece is called Matthew25, and I don't remember the
exact words, but it involves youshall feed the hungry, house
the homeless, and this is againa plumb bob.
The words in the Bible would beclothe the naked, but I went
(19:10):
with the plumb bob.
So that's what I do, and thispiece was a response to how
anxious I felt during that twoweeks and I felt very good about
making this piece and I feltvery good about the experience I
had.
So that is my presentation.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
Thank you so much, Jerry, and I very much
appreciate your presentation andsharing all of this work and
the thoughts behind it.
I was just going to say Iappreciate your candor about how
you tapped into what you feltto be able to create this work.
I think that's such animportant part of the work of
(19:55):
any artist and you've just laidit out beautifully for us, and
also the fact that you evenpointed out that it helped you
through your work and I don'tthink that's true of just
lawyers, but certainly, I think,as lawyers and dealing with the
types of cases that you dealtwith in your work, lawyering and
then as a judge.
It was perhaps such a crucialpart of your personality that
(20:19):
you are an artist that you wereable to process it that way.
I would love to hear yourthoughts about that.
Speaker 3 (20:25):
Yes, for me it was, and as I got a little space
between myself and the trauma ofit, I discovered that that's
everybody's issue.
No matter what someone isfacing, that creates anxiety and
difficulty.
Lean into it were the words.
(20:48):
I came out of it.
Lean into it and chiding,moving the problem to the side
was not working for me at all.
I decided I just need toaddress it, and for me that was
making out of balance.
But for somebody else it'sdoing whatever they do to
(21:11):
express themselves writing, youknow writing, singing, you name
it.
So I learned a good lesson onthe healing power of art.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
We have a comment in the chat from Vince Proffey that
they love the interactivenature of your work, Jerry.
Speaker 5 (21:36):
Jerry, thank you.
It's Emily.
I just wanted to say thank youso much for sharing your story
with us all, because I thinkit's so important to talk about
these things and to share thesekinds of coping mechanisms, and
I think you know, these arethings that maybe people you
(21:58):
know years ago probably wouldn'thave raised, wouldn't have
talked about, wouldn't have beenso open about.
I think it's so helpful toother people that we have these
conversations now and, um, it'sreally inspiring.
Your story is really, as is yourart, of course, and I wanted to
ask you whether, when you sortof started to lean into those
(22:25):
feelings you were having throughdoing your work and expressing,
I guess, your feelings andmaybe the depression, the
anxiety in that way, was it sortof an intuitive feeling that
you knew that would make youfeel better, or it was more of a
kind of intellectual processwhereby you thought, okay, I
(22:46):
have to make myself do thisbecause I know it will be
helpful to me.
Or was it more of a, like I say, more of an intuitive feeling
that you did the work and thenmaybe the realization came later
that actually that was aprocess that was really helpful.
So then you sort of would sayto yourself okay, I'm feeling
like this, so I need to do thework.
Maybe it's not something thatyou know intuitively, I just
(23:11):
would go to do, but I know thatif I push myself to do it I will
feel better.
I don't know if that made sense.
No, I got you.
Speaker 3 (23:20):
No, it wasn't intuitive, because it didn't.
What was it?
It was watching Sulika do thatwith her cancer, and I had never
seen, I had never thought aboutthat before.
And this I'm talking about afilm.
(23:40):
You could watch it tonight.
It just was, oh, she's got theworst thing in the world going
on.
She's near death and she'sgoing to paint how she feels.
And she doesn't paint.
So no, it was strictly.
She delivered me a gift and Isaid, well, let me try, and it
(24:08):
was.
It worked for me.
It worked for me.
I leaned into what I do.
Speaker 5 (24:16):
Yeah, amazing and that is an amazing film.
I kind of came upon it bychance, but it's really, yeah,
it is very inspiring and it kindof stays with you.
Yeah, I would recommend gettingto watch it.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
Yeah, and I was just going to say it's interesting
because you've shared with usthese pieces that you had made
prior to that, I believe and thefact that you had already had
that experience with processingyour uh, feelings and your
anxiety through your art, andthat it would take something
(24:55):
else, like an external stimulus,like the film, to be able to
help you link that in for thiscurrent challenge with the last
show.
Speaker 3 (25:05):
Well, I wasn't aware that I was doing it.
That was part of the light.
I never thought consciouslythat when I'd get up in the
morning nervous about my day aseverybody is, whatever their day
may be that going into mystudio and making a juror was
(25:27):
leaning into anxiety.
It was making a juror, it was.
It put a smile on my face and,and you know so, no it it.
And so the end of that storywas that I looked back and said,
oh, I have been doing this.
I never thought about it.
(25:48):
Maybe I was a little deeper inthe weeds on this one that I'm,
you know, my example I'm usingfor the show, but you know I
think we all, we all do it invarious ways.
So I thank you all for yourquestions and comments and glad
(26:11):
to be here.
Speaker 2 (26:12):
Thank you so much.
So we will turn to GinaMcLeveen, who is going to share
her experience having differentaspects of creating paintings
about loss and grief.
Gina.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
I can't begin without also just kind of praising
Jerry and that presentation abit before of just how moving it
really is your artwork and alsoyour message-y-ness.
I'm glad that it is that Iwanted the first piece that you
brought up.
I don't know if you're familiarwith this artist, jerry, but
her name is Phil.
(26:47):
I think it's a Filda Barlow.
She had a piece that was in theCarnegie International.
She had a piece that was in theCarnegie International which is
held in Pittsburgh.
It's called Upturned House.
I saw it when I like the senioryear of high school or something
like that and it was reallyreally moving.
It has a similar upturnedunbalancedness to it.
So I would really recommend yousee that work at some point.
(27:10):
You see that work at some pointand on that um, I think that
your work so much of um, eventhe the faltering with the
justice falling down.
It reminded me of another pieceI saw at the carnegie
international.
It was inflated balloons, um,and the balloons inflated
balloons yeah, with likedifferent letters and they
spelled out various acts of aninternational law.
(27:32):
That's not coming into mindright now, but it was a human
rights law and the internationallasts like several months, so
over time these balloons wouldobviously lose their air and
kind of collapse.
Um, and as I'm referencingthese pieces, I'm just like
jerry has this quality that,like you, should apply to the
carnegie international if youwant it um, your work is amazing
(27:53):
.
I love the materials that youuse.
Both my grandfathers arewoodworkers.
My late grandfather would maketoys for us as kids and he'd
always bring those out, so itwas a sweet presentation that
you gave.
I also resonate personally withthe jury box.
I just stepped into aprosecutorial role so I have
(28:17):
obviously a lot of interactionswith jury members coming up and
I think that is a reallyprecious illustration of jurors.
I tend to focus more onrealistic representation, so I
love like seeing people in anabstract sense.
That was really really welldone, so thank you?
Yeah, absolutely so.
(28:39):
My work, as I said, and similarto Jerry's, it's this leaning
in aspect to the negative andthe hard and the heavy.
For me, it's a lot around griefand loss.
For me, it's a lot around griefand loss, which seems to have
been a pattern that I didn'trealize a lot until I started
(29:00):
taking a look at the experiencespeople were telling me about or
the works that I was creating.
It was almost like we weretalking about a natural kind of
reaction to when I was hurting.
I would grab my paint brushesand I'd go downstairs and I'd
just, you know, paint what I wasfeeling, and that had a way of,
you know, letting the hardstuff roll off and turning the
(29:23):
really negative emotions intosomething I could step back and
be like wow, that's reallybeautiful.
A piece that I did.
It's called Fisherman on theRoof.
A piece that I did.
(29:48):
It's called Fisherman on theRoof.
This is a piece that I createdon a wood panel and my family
live in Pennsylvania and so Ididn't have a car down in DC, so
my dad would often drive andpick me up and in the summers we
would stop at this orchard onour way down to DC and get fresh
peaches and it was a family runfarm and that sort of thing.
(30:10):
So the year of 2021, which wasthe same year that I graduated
from law school we turned intothe farm, like we did the past
two years our annual little tripand I saw that they had like a
grad sign, like congratulations2021, grad sign, and I made a
mental note to you know, askabout that when I, when we got
to the you know the peaches andthe checkout line and things, so
(30:34):
we were the only ones in there.
It was early morning.
My dad picked up his peachesand I'm looking around at the
it's basically a garage wherethey sell everything out of our
barn and they had pictures oflike little kids on the walls
and so I just quipped, I waslike which one of these is the
college graduate?
And the older woman at the cashregister just goes completely
(30:57):
silent.
And I have that oh no, whathave I done?
Kind of moment.
You know, like what did I?
What did I say?
And then she proceeds to tellme that he had passed away, he
did not finish his graduationyear, but they still put the
sign up for him.
He was involved in a caraccident Obviously not what I
(31:19):
was expecting to hear at all Wasreally moved by not only his
legacy that she was relaying tous, but also the way that she
was handling it, because it wasstill very fresh.
We were there in June.
I think the accident had takenplace a few weeks even prior to
that.
So, everything being reallyfresh, and I walked away from
(31:42):
that interaction being like, oh,I didn't even ask his name,
like that was, that would havebeen the simplest way to try to
figure out, or like remember theperson, try to figure out, or
like remember the person.
So I'm driving out the driveway, dad has his peaches and things
and I'm just like, oh, whatcould his name be?
And for whatever reason,alexander came to mind.
(32:03):
So I kept that in my mind thewhole way we're driving back to
DC.
And the second my dad dropped meoff at my apartment.
I started doing Google searchesfrom the area we were in, the
name Alexander.
I eventually find his obituaryand the individual's name was
Kai Alexander Burkett.
He wasn't.
He was 17 years old, I believeat the time of the accident, a
(32:27):
wrestler.
He had so much ahead of him.
And in that reading all of thatand just that entire
interaction.
A week later I call back to theorchard and I say Hi, I don't
know if you're going to rememberme had the conversation with
the same woman I had a weekprior and I said Can I do a
painting for your family?
Almost as a way of like, anoffering, like I, I just really
(32:50):
feel I need to do this.
I was like I don't know howlong it's going to take.
Do you have any specificrequests?
Things like that.
They had no requests, they werejust honored that I even, you
know, was offering this to them.
So, again, I had just graduated,so I was in the middle of
figuring out my own life.
(33:10):
I carded this two feet by fourfeet board with me everywhere I
went.
I moved back to Pennsylvania, Iwas studying for the bar exam
and so on my time from studyingfor the bar.
When I wasn't studying for thebar, I was down making a mess of
this painting.
I eventually finished it aroundthe time that I was headed to
(33:30):
Maryland where I sat for my barexam.
So along the way, obviously thatwas July, so it was peach
season all over again.
So I was like dad he was, hewent with me, thankfully, had
some moral support for the barexam as well.
So we piled up in the car againand we drove down to the
orchard on our way to Baltimorewhere I was taking the bar exam.
(33:54):
And we get to the orchard, dadgets out and gets his peaches.
I'm carrying this big canvas upto our wood panel, up to the
same barn we were in about ayear prior, and the same woman
was there and I was like I don'tknow if you're going to
remember me, but here's the andI'm crying.
She's crying um, and she askedme she's like, can I give this
(34:17):
to my daughter, which would havebeen Kai's mom?
Um, and I said, of course, dowith it whatever you want, um,
around Christmas of that year.
Well, actually, um, carry on,go take the bar exam.
I remember my dad asking likeyou know, are you nervous about
the bar exam?
And I was.
My dad asking like you know,are you nervous about the bar
exam?
And I was like, dad, honestly,I could care less about an exam
(34:39):
like that.
What we just did, like that'swhat I want to do, you know,
like, whatever it is law, art,like that feeling, that's all I.
That's like what I'm chasingright moments like that.
And so, again, like in Decemberof that year, I got a message
from Kai's mom saying that, witha picture of this painting hung
(35:01):
up in the new edition of theirhouse, she was really struggling
at the time with his death andalso, when this painting arrived
, of changing the house at all.
That's something that happens alot in grief, like when you
lose someone, you wanteverything to stay the same.
You don't want, um, you want toleave things the way they were
when that person was around.
So, um, she was like gettingthat painting was like
(35:24):
confirmation for her to likemove forward with this building
projects on their house.
So, um, sorry, uh, kai and thispainting is in their family
room.
They had seven kids.
Kai was the second oldest, sohe had an older brother.
Each of these waves depict thechildren of the family this pond
(35:56):
.
Because he had an EternityOutdoors channel.
He was super into the outdoorsand I watched through the videos
just trying to study like whowas this kid, who is this person
?
And there was this one video ofhim grabbing a lawn chair on
his parents' roof and fishingoff into the pond, and he had an
umbrella, originally attachedto the chair, and then the wind
kept blowing the umbrella.
So he goes inside and grabs thesombrero and I'm like, I feel
(36:18):
like this is the only like thiscould be the only kid that
thought to do this and I thoughtthat would be a beautiful way
to capture him and who he was.
The lanterns off to the sidethey did a memorial of the
service you know in his honorand so this is kind of depicting
that.
All the people that would haveknown and loved him standing
(36:38):
around this pool that he'sfishing into obviously the
orchard, the peaches of how Iknow and understand the family
yeah, that was.
This is the story of Kai.
I, my dad, just went and gotpeaches last month or two months
ago.
I guess at this point I'mlosing track of time, but yeah,
(36:59):
they're a special family.
He was clearly a special personand this piece obviously holds
a really big place in my heartbecause of just who they are and
who he was.
Around the same time, in thislaw school slash, becoming a
licensed attorney time frame, Ihad several again, just several
(37:20):
stories of either friends orclassmates just telling me about
their loss.
I don't know what is.
I joke sometimes where I shouldhave like trauma just tattooed
on my forehead because, forwhatever reason, people are,
just, they share with me somereally difficult experiences and
I treat that very delicatelyand as a super big honor and
(37:42):
privilege and a purpose.
Honestly, this first piece,mermaid mama I call her my law
school classmate our 2l yearlost her to cancer.
I can't imagine going through Iknow everyone always says that
right, I can't imagine.
I can't imagine.
But truly on top of a pandemicand everything else, just going
(38:05):
to law school is difficult,right, anyone in that time is
incredibly hard.
She dealt with it and I wouldhave been a mess.
She was, she's much strongerthan I am.
(38:25):
But she asked at our graduationif I would paint a picture of
her mom, which I did.
I had met her mom our 1L year,so this was a very difficult
piece.
It was kind of the first timesomeone formally asked me to
paint someone who they lost andit had a huge responsibility
attached to it, right, not onlybecause I met her mom, but also
(38:45):
this was our chance to preservesome of who she was for my law
school classmate.
I struggled a lot personally indoing it.
You know, constantly kind ofasking myself, asking her mom
right, like, should I put thiscolor here.
What about this, you know?
Should I incorporate this?
My law school classmate hadgiven me she knew she wanted her
(39:11):
in like a Lily Pulitzer styledress because she wore those all
the time.
She loved mermaids.
They would vacation to Hawaiitogether all the time.
So that was the essence of ofthat piece.
Then a law school professor hadtold me the story about her mom,
who also tragically died whileshe was in law school, who,
(39:33):
after she had given one of hermock or moot court competition
arguments when she was a lawstudent, her mom had given her a
dozen roses with underwear,lingerie in it and a note that
said stay wild.
And as my law professor wastelling me this story, you know
(39:54):
she was clearly moved by it andI wanted to create a painting
for her to help remember her mom.
So this hangs in her office asa way to, you know, remember her
mom as well.
All of these pieces were puttogether, probably in a matter
of four months, I would say so.
(40:14):
The last instance was a friendfrom Pennsylvania had lost her
mom as well and immediatelytexted me in the same breath,
almost.
You know, mom passed away.
Would you create a painting ofher and this one?
I had never met her mother, soit was a much different
(40:35):
experience.
I had never even really seenher mom, so this was the first
time I was seeing her and Icaught the resemblance of how
much she looked like my friend,and this was one of her last,
probably portraits taken.
It was at her my friend's son'swedding that this picture was
(40:57):
depicted and based off of.
Again, just a way, almost likean offering, like someone brings
a, you know, a dish to someoneafter a funeral or something
like that a hot dish.
I felt like this piece was myoffering where I traveled back
to Pennsylvania I was still inDC at the time and you know
expressing my condolences forthe loss of her mom.
(41:18):
And, yeah, this was my again,just something I treat as my
gift, my offering to people whohave experienced loss and
entering into that grief withthem, to the point that I might
not personally have experiencedthe loss, but it's almost like
that vicarious grief to use kindof the legal term where you're
(41:42):
going through the motions withand alongside them, helping them
carry the burden of whatthey've gone.
And then, lastly, I will sharewith you all some of my grief.
So these are images of mygrandparents.
(42:07):
My paternal grandparents areboth now deceased and my
maternal grandparents are,thankfully, still with us.
Last year they celebrated their70th wedding anniversary.
I created this painting forthat event.
I had known for a while that Iwanted to create portraits of
(42:28):
them.
I'm the youngest of all thegrandkids, so I always feel a
bit uh, shorted on time withthem, uh, whereas my older
cousins have kind of gone aboutand had their lives and their
kids and their homes and havesettled I am a few years behind,
we'll say so um, my wanting tocreate these portraits of them
(42:52):
was my way of preserving themfor the people who will enter
into my life that won't get tomeet them personally.
I have visions of these piecesin my home someday and can point
out to my kids and explain andtell them stories about my
grandparents.
And I found in this process I'llsay specifically for my
(43:14):
paternal grandfather here hepassed away when, um, I was
still in high school it was thesummer before my uh senior year
and in creating this uh piece alittle over 10 years later, um,
it was really hard to recall hisface, um, his resemblance,
(43:35):
resemblance, and I struggled abit.
I relied on my older brotherfor critiques and helping me
re-remember what my grandparentor grandfather looked like,
whereas the others who werestill living at the time, I was
much more able to recall howthey looked and able to capture
(43:55):
their resemblances a bit moreeasily and naturally.
So that's a bit of myexperience with painting through
grief and loss.
It's a theme I feel like I'mexploring constantly.
It's work that I enjoy doing.
(44:17):
I think it's an emotional laborof love and care and
responsibility, preserving whopeople are for the people who
love them, and it helps mepersonally, like I said, in
dealing with the the grief andgiving it space to breathe
(44:38):
through paint and storytellingand things like that.
Speaker 2 (44:43):
Thank you so much, Gina.
I also wanted to just follow upon a couple of points that
you've raised in the articlethat you wrote, as well as here
the idea of doing portraitureversus a still life to honor the
memory of someone.
Could you speak to that?
Speaker 1 (45:04):
so, um, the pieces I created, uh, as soon as my
paternal grandfather died, um, Ihad done a charcoal drawing of
boots with crumpled up pieces ofmoney around them.
It was a phrase my grandfatherwould use all the time.
He would say bet your boots.
And then another piece I did,again almost immediately
(45:26):
following his death, was layingin the grass, there was a Bible,
one of the wood figures that hehad created.
This was an acrylic paintingand then a picture of us from
one of his birthdays.
So it's me, super young, andhim like blowing out candles on
a cake.
And I realized, looking back,how, in the moment, after my own
(45:54):
grief, I really struggled with,you know, grief, I really
struggled with, you know,dealing with the loss of my
grandfather and almost likedepicting his person immediately
for my own sake.
So how I dealt with it wasthrough the things he left
behind, the moments I rememberedabout him that I didn't want to
forget, like the things he saidor the things that he loved to
(46:18):
do.
It was my inability to kind offace that he was gone and, like
I said, it took me about 10years, a little over 10 years,
to finally create a paintingwith his actual portrait and in
that time I realized I forgot abit about how he looked.
I had to rely on photographsthat I couldn't paint him from
(46:40):
life.
I couldn't.
It shocked me honestly how muchof him I had forgotten.
So creating the still lifeimmediately were again just my
inability to face the fact thathe was gone.
It was the only thing,creatively, I could muster up to
kind of deal with him no longerbeing here and not seeing him
(47:00):
anymore.
Speaker 2 (47:05):
And I appreciate it so much that you were I'm not
sure if you were looking for itintentionally or just found it
when you were doing the article,but looking back at other
artists who had done the samething.
Speaker 1 (47:16):
Yeah, so I had learned that I was on some sort
of museum tour, I think in theNational Gallery of Art, and the
docent had pointed that outthat this was a portrait that
Van Gogh had done to honor hisfather.
It was similarly to books inthe Bible, just depicting maybe
(47:39):
similarly how Van Gogh may havefelt with the loss of his father
, that inability to kind of justface the fact that they are
gone and really just looking atthe things they leave behind,
because in the end, when they'regone, that's all we have.
Yeah, it was really striking tome as well finding that and was
(48:01):
a way other artists who havecome, you know way before me
have have dealt with grief andthe loss of someone.
They love.
Speaker 2 (48:10):
Yeah, yeah.
Thank you so much for sharingall of the work and your process
and and your experiencecreating that work.
Does anyone have any questionsor comments that they'd want to
share about what Gina hasoffered?
Speaker 3 (48:28):
I just want to say that the work is beautiful.
The story is powerful.
I got tears in my eyes, gina.
I got tears in my eyes, gina.
You're hitting it on a lot ofdirections.
Yourself, you are helpingyourself heal and you're helping
(48:50):
a lot of people heal the motherof I, the family, et cetera, et
cetera.
That's beautiful.
Speaker 5 (49:02):
Thank you.
Yeah, I was going to sayexactly the same.
Gina.
Thank you so much for sharingthat story and all of your
beautiful, beautiful work.
And, yeah, such beautifulstories and so very generous,
gina.
So generous because doing thoseworks I know you were saying
you know it helped you as well,but that's such a massive sort
(49:24):
of emotional investment and youdidn't know that family with the
peaches and wow, and you becamepart of their lives, they
became a big part of your lifeover all of that time and, um,
yes, amazing, gina, reallyamazing thank you yeah, hi, gina
(49:44):
, I don't know what to say.
Speaker 4 (49:46):
Like I haven't like looked at art from this
perspective before.
Like I know that you could.
You can use art to expressgrief, but having someone like
do it and I'm looking andlistening this is the first time
that I'm seeing this kind ofart done live.
This is the first time I'mexperiencing this.
(50:07):
And this is so powerful becauserecently a friend of mine lost
a dad and we've been talkingabout it.
The burial is a few weeks andit's, it's just like, it's so
beautiful, like what you'redoing is so beautiful, it's so
powerful, I think.
Well, that's all I have to say.
Like it's, it's powerful thankyou.
Speaker 1 (50:31):
Yeah, I am right there with you.
I also, um, I lost my maternalgrandma uh, about two months ago
now, at this point, and it was.
I'll save a lot of the details,but I was in Paris and the day
before I left I went to theLouvre and I saw the Mona Lisa
for the first time, and a fewyears ago I thought about I
(50:55):
wanted to do a painting of mygrandma.
It's similar to like a MonaLisa, but just in the fact I
don't know if anyone knows thisthe Mona Lisa has her own
mailbox and I love that factabout her.
I love that people can writeher notes and my grandma was
someone who, all through lawschool, always wrote me letters
and notes and things like that.
(51:16):
So I have this vision ofcreating a portrait of my
grandma.
I hope it doesn't take me 10years, like it did my
grandfather, where I will have aportrait just of her, with some
sort of mailbox where peoplecan come and write letters,
offer I don't know what, maybelike it's a way of them to deal
(51:37):
with their own losses andparting words that maybe they
didn't get, um the the backendof then that story.
So I saw the Mona Lisa, andthen I traveled home and my
flight was going to be delayedand I called my dad and my
brother.
I was, like, can you come getme?
Like I really just want to behome, um, and so they do they.
They pick me up at the airport.
That was much further than myoriginal, you know, ending
(52:00):
destination was supposed to be,and on the way home dad told me
that you know, grandma might notbe there when we get back.
So we drive across the state andthe next morning I went and see
my grandma and the firstquestion she asked me was how
was your trip?
And like she is, she's on herway out, like very clearly, um,
(52:25):
and I just think more people, uh, talking about.
You know their losses and theirgrief and dealing with it,
whether with however they needto.
Um is really important, um, andshe did not make it past that
day, uh, and so I want to beable to honor her through my art
making process just as much,whether it's through writing,
like jerry was saying, whetherit was through, um, you know,
creating a movie, creating adance, creating wood sculptures,
(52:48):
creating whatever it is, if youcan partner with someone when
they're going through reallydifficult things through art, it
really, like I can tell you, itchanges people's lives.
You'll change your outlook asan artist and it's yeah, it's an
honor to be able to step intothose kinds of things and
feelings with people there willbe links in the show notes to
(53:12):
learn more.
Speaker 2 (53:14):
if you were intrigued by this podcast, it would be
much appreciated if you couldleave a rating, a review and tag
Warfare of Art and Law podcast.
Until next time, this isStephanie Drotty bringing you
Warfare of Art and Law.
Thank you so much for listeningand remember injustice anywhere
is a threat to justiceeverywhere.
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