Edith

Oil on linen, 24” x 18”, 2025

I found this image of an anonymous woman in an institution. I don’t know what was happening in that moment, but I felt it—the raw desire to scream, to be heard, to not hold back. It’s pure expression. She doesn’t need to be pretty or sweet. She’s angry about something, and she’s letting us know.

The bird beside her is a goldfinch—a symbol of expression and of singing one’s own song. We know that many women were institutionalized simply for expressing themselves, for refusing to do what was “required and expected” of a wife, of a woman.

If she wasn’t heard then, I hope we can all hear her now.