Social and Political

Unborn Child 3
Embroidery on Linen Dress
2009-2010

Unborn Child 3, detail 1

Unborn Child 3, detail 2

Art Center Silkeborg Bad, 2007

"Always sympathetic to the plight of victims everywhere, Norgaard's idea for these tapestries came in 1993 when fighting in Somalia was raging at the same time that the war in Bosnia escalated. She began collecting old gas cans and when she ran out of used ones, she bought some new ones. Using strips she cut from the cans, Norgaard wove frames of the metal so that the printed messages were visible. Then she wove 22 small tapestries that show the faces of victims. Each face is wounded or contorted or grieving. On is the body of a black woman in a blue dress lying like a rag doll on a bloody patch of ground."
Ann Katzenbach, Port Townsend Leader, Feb. 16, 1994

 

In the spring and summer of 1999, three woman I know were all diagnosed with breast cancer. This was overwhelming. I followed these women, and what this whole experience did to them. Being an artist, I needed to express my experiences too, and in some way to get out of my own system the metaphor of moths. Moths do their work in the dark. You do not really know they are there before damage has been done. This silent work has been going on without you knowing, and now has to be mended. With any life-threatening diagnosis you have to put your life on hold, and, first and foremost, you must deal with this intrusion.