2020

The theme was about a deaf life experience during the pandemic, using a chart with a list of events, names, places and so on, that an artist can choose from. An example would be this- Day 21, I chose Dinner Table Syndrome. This is the first artwork on “dinner table syndrome” I have painted about, and the image is very small and hard to illustrate and paint on the inside base. The image showed, my family apologizing to me, in 2020, after I asked questions about our Native American ancestors. I remember vividly how frustrated I was at the table, asking my family to tell me what was about, and they told me to, "wait, I will tell you later, not now" and so on. In the picture, shows a person sitting at the left corner with question marks above the head which happened to be me when I was ten years old, not understanding what my family were talking about. In the image, there is a group of our ancestors in their sacred regalia and headdresses behind. That was my vision of what they were discussing about and I looked back and learned just how much have I lost all of the stories they were talking about our ancestors.

Nancy Rourke

2020

2021

Watercolor and ink

The 11 by 14 inch artwork, “2020”, is from a “24-day advent calendar” that I purchased for $4.43, and carefully peeled off the outside and inside bases and primed them. I added four more doors and carefully cut the doors and left them closed. Each door is from one to two inch size. I painted tiny pictures, using Kuretake GANSAI TAMBI watercolour, a water brush pen and a MANGAKA 01 ink pen. The artwork was from the annual De’VIA February Challenge that has been going on since 2014, and each day an artist would share an artwork on De’VIA Central Facebook. The theme was about a deaf life experience during the pandemic, using a chart with a list of events, names, places and so on, that an artist can choose from. An example would be this- Day 21, I chose Dinner Table Syndrome. This is the first artwork on “dinner table syndrome” I have painted about, and the image is very small and hard to illustrate and paint on the inside base. The image showed, my family apologizing to me, in 2020, after I asked questions about our Native American ancestors. I remember vividly how frustrated I was at the table, asking my family to tell me what was about, and they told me to, "wait, I will tell you later, not now" and so on. In the picture, shows a person sitting at the left corner with question marks above the head which happened to be me when I was ten years old, not understanding what my family were talking about. In the image, there is a group of our ancestors in their sacred regalias and headdresses behind. That was my vision of what they were discussing about and I looked back and learned just how much have I lost all of the stories they were talking about our ancestors. I completed all 28 images and applied rubber cement on both the outside and inside bases. Then I carefully attached them together. After that, I forgot what the images were, inside the doors until I opened its first door on February 1st. I have a blog https://febchallenge.wordpress.com that tells a story behind each door. My name is Nancy Rourke, and I am a Deaf artist, using De’VIA movement since 2009. I am from San Diego, California, and am an enrolled member of Mesa Grande Band of Mission Indians in the Kumeyaay Nation. I reside in Loveland, Colorado.