Within a week of the first meeting of Common Ground participants last fall, Gemma Hobbs and Erica Siegal, who’d been matched as teammates, had a single art session and created what they thought would be their finalized artwork for the project.
“We’re both early and productive,” says Gemma, a former interior designer and house stager who, these days, creates primarily 3-D botanical displays. “We thought we were finished.”
But, in fact, the discarded wire birdcage Gemma found in the trash that became the inspiration for their piece was just a beginning. In recent weeks — with further conversations, the addition of another birdcage Gemma found on Facebook Marketplace, a mix of other materials and some “play” time — the project is becoming both amplified and refined.
“We’re deconstructing to construct,” says Erica, who is hearing impaired and a former member of a traveling theater group for artists with disabilities.
Initially, Gemma and Erica beat up the original birdcage with hammers, the bent and twisted wires and broken door standing as metaphors for the challenges, wounds and defeats we all encounter throughout life. Now it has been joined with a second cage with an upward-facing open door that represents a rebirth, a reawakening, a release.
They’ve also added vines and moss, which signify both entanglements and connections, and the growth that can come from them. A mixed-media structure made of cloth and string represents a “cocoon,” the beginning of an emerging new sense of self, and scattered butterflies complete the transformation.
“We just toss out random ideas as we work,” says Erica. “Honestly, we just talk and all of a sudden things come into place. I’m having so much fun with it.”
Though the women are separated in age by a generation and have encountered very different challenges in life — Gemma has been married twice, has three stepchildren and lives alone; Erica, who has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder in addition to her hearing disabilities now lives with and helps her elderly parents — they still found they have many commonalities.
“One thing we’ve shared is anxiety and depression,” says Gemma. “The reasons we’ve struggled are different. Mine came more from the challenges of having a blended family…”
“And mine are more from situational challenges — my hearing and my bipolar,” adds Erica. “But in the end it comes down to the same thing. Depression is depression.”
Working collaboratively on their project has also provided an opportunity for both women to exercise a coping skill they appreciate.
“It’s so important to take time for yourself,” Gemma says. “This is light and play and fun and that’s really important.”
Recently Erica, who has a cochlear implant and only about 28 percent hearing, learned that she will have to get a second implant, rendering her completely deaf without aids.
“It’s pretty heartbreaking,” she admits. “It’s hard for me to be social because of my deafness — it’s worse than the bipolar — because people look at me like I’m stupid. It tends to make me very isolated. So this project has pulled me out of the house.”
Though the two women have yet to formally title their piece, they’re leaning toward “Emergence.”
“The bottom cage is all about the struggle,” says Gemma. “The top is the overcoming. That’s where we are…emerging.”
All participants in “Common Ground,” including the collaborating organizers, are donating their time to the project. If you’d like to help with the expenses involved in art materials, promotion and exhibition costs, we welcome tax-deductible donations to the SPAACES Art Foundation (nonprofit EIN 84-500-4237). You can donate online at the SPAACES website (https://spaaces.art) or you can send a check to SPAACES, at 2087 Princeton St., Sarasota, FL 34237.
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