Emily Dooley

Who did you lose?

I lost my sister to cancer and coped through art. Here's what I ask if you want a glimpse into my mind or into grief itself. I understand it more than I should, more than anyone should.

The philosophical inspiration

Jack Kornfield-

A Buddhist monk who wrote The Wise Heart which is practically my bible. He discusses realistic approaches to happiness. If you see me smiling in these pieces, it represents a cold smirk, a mask which we’re wearing all the time and breaking out from even if we have good skincare routines.

The poets of inspiration

Alejandro Jodorowsky, Nai Palm and her crow-

Alejandro Jodorowsky's autobiographies, endless poetry and the dance of reality, are about coming of age and letting go of childhood which is a huge theme in my llama piece where I hold up lama shaped hands, remembering how my sister and I used to pretend our hands were llamas and we'd talk to one another with our llama hand characters. Nai Palm, a singer of the band Hiatus Kaiyote, discusses how a rescued fledgling crow scratched her face one morning. After she let it free she tattooed the crow’s scratch on her face so she always remembered it. She taught me that we don't need to let go of the ones we’ve lost, we hold them in our bodies. We can hold onto grief like it’s a child. It has needs.

The painter of inspiration

Edward Povey-

“Friends hardly noticed. In the way he was already turning away from their reaching hands, in the way he romanced the room but was absent in the moments of intimacy, natural and proficient in finding excuses for his sudden departures. Few knew that he had been rolled and handled by monsters, scrubbed and massaged by sticky hands in the twilight years of his malevolent childhood.”