My Glorious Condition
Opening Reception:
November 14, 6 -9 PM
I awoke one morning a couple of weeks ago from a dream where I had just taken a selfie with my father. For maybe three seconds I think I actually believed that it had really happened. Slowly my brain woke up and took over and realized nope, that had not happened. My father died 15 years ago.
It is crazy to think about now. 15 years. Where did those 15 years go? A better question is where did the 17 years before these 15 go? For 17 years I had an absent father. At the time I tried to act like I didn’t care and even convinced myself that I didn’t care at all. The truth is I probably did, a lot.
Now I don’t really think my father was absent by choice. As I get older I slowly realize that both of us just did the best we knew how, at the time. I think that’s what we human beings in relationship usually do – the best we know how. The thought helps me when I think about my father.
I watched a preacher do a sermon on youtube last year called “Jesus Turned Around” He says in the beginning that he thinks (and I totally agree) that the countenance of the father sets the atmosphere for the home. This got me thinking . . . what does this mean for me as a person who didn’t really have a father in the home?
For a long time I had known intellectually that God was my “Abba Father” but I couldn’t come to grips with it in my heart. I did not live in that reality.
Last year my exhibit was focused on healing. I called it “Flowers One Day: Healing in the Intersection of Art and Faith” after that was over I began to think about what was next for me. The natural conclusion was to work with the concept of identity. I had worked on the healing, now I needed to figure out how to put those healed parts of me back together and figure out the identity of that person.
For the last 15 years I have had boxes of my father’s belongings in storage. I didn’t really have any interest in them and didn’t know what to do with them. But in the last couple years I’ve been forcing myself to face my demons. For me one of my demons was my own guilt about my part in my relationship with my father. I had to tackle this part of me.
I decided to take his clothing, military uniforms mostly, and use them in my art-making process. But use them how? I never knew my father very intimately. But his military uniforms are an intimate thing, he wore them. They represent a part of him that I never knew or understood. I took 2 boxes and opened them. At first I hung them around my studio. They hung there as I worked on my art. In this way I was able to invite him to get to know me, in doing something I really care about; a part of me he was never able to relate to.
Simultaneously I studied the scriptures. I started with scriptures that talked about God as Father and also verses that talked about God’s face. I wanted to get to know God’s face. If the father’s countenance sets the atmosphere for the home than I should look to the Father’s countenance towards me to know the reality in which I live. In doing this research and looking back to the original languages I was able to get a deeper of meaning of what it means when God “shines his face” or when he is referred to as “Abba Father”
So, with this exhibit I am taking my father’s military uniforms and taking them apart and using them to create dresses. My background is in fashion design and I’ve always loved fashion and been interested in it since I was a little girl. Our clothing is one of the primary ways in which we outwardly interpret and display out identity, who we are, we communicate, in part, through our clothing. We embody our clothing and it also embodies us. To explore the concept of identity through dressmaking seemed like a logical choice.
So, with this exhibit I am taking my father’s military uniforms and taking them apart and using them to create dresses. I don’t expect to completely understand God the Father once I’m done with this exhibit. And I’m not going to be reconciled with my earthly father either. But this is what I know how to do with what I’ve got. Working with my father’s uniforms has helped me to feel like I’m spending time with him, showing him my art. And going through his things and working with the clothes he actually wore for so long helps me to feel like I’m getting to know him too. It might sound strange and I can’t fully articulate at this point but it helps. It helps me. I’ve been finding things in the pockets and going through those things has been interesting as well.
My father didn’t relate well to me, he never got the “Best Dad Ever” coffee mug from me but I wasn’t the best daughter ever either. We were two very different people trying our best to make a normal father/daughter relationship work and we failed terribly. Now he’s gone and all I have is my art and his things so I do what I can the best way I know how.
I’m trying to take all these things and focus on now. At the end of this life I don’t want to realize that I screwed up my relationship with my Father too. So I am trying to focus on him and what it means to be a daughter of Abba Father and the Glorious Condition of Υἱοθεσία that is my reality.
Huiothes (Υἱοθεσία) – the nature and Glorious Condition of the true disciples of Christ in the future life after the visible return of Christ from heaven; to be adopted as a son or daughter into a divine family, to be treated and cared for as one’s own child including complete rights of inheritance (Ephesians 1:5, Romans 9:4)
“Jesus Turned Around” (Sermon by Pastor Judah Smith)
Christina Young’s Portfolio Website
Click For More Info on A Glorious Condition Exhibit
