Touching The Art And It Touching Back

Casey Jane Ellison is the mastermind, and I do truly mean a mastermind, behind the web series, Touching The Art.  When I first discovered this youtube channel a few months ago, I was struck by how it's both serious and seriously funny.  Art (people in art, not the works themselves, because that would be impossible) so often takes itself so f*cking seriously that whimsy, humor, any sort of lightness of being, immediately discredits you.  What 'Touching the Art' does is address very real issues within the art community, large and small scale, and how women and people of color are always given the identifiers of: Female Artist (white), African-American Artist (male), Female African-American Artist, Hispanic Artist (male), etc.  We live in a world where 'white male' is the default, and the rest of the art world has to be segregated into their proper categories lest there be chaos.  This makes me not just a female artist, but a lesbian female artist.  Given that I'm a woman, my persona could be further broken down by age because our male dominated society is also ageist, making me a middle-aged, lesbian, female artist.  The lesbian and female may seem redundant, but trust me, it isn't. 

        Rosbro Cigar Smoking Snowmen, Pittsburgh 2014

To wrap things up I've included a pic of my favorite vintage cigar smoking plastic snowmen from the 1950s.  Take it away, guys!  I love me some inappropriate whimsy.