AILEEN TIERNEY
LADDER (8.5 x 8.5, mixed media)
Like any collage, the materials I used are modest: my eyes were drawn to the lace and florals I found in the back of magazines about dollhouses, fashion, and antiques. The central text was cut out from a self-help therapy book. Initially, I only conceptualized LADDER as an attempt to narrativize this melodramatic excerpt, juxtaposing a volatile inner conflict with primly repressed domesticity. Retroactively, however, I realized that I made this collage during a summer where marriage and partnership weighed heavily on my mind. It’s fascinating to me how chance-based and mixed-media art such as collage can be a subconscious mirror, reflecting something that only makes sense in hindsight.
AILEEN TIERNEY is a PhD candidate in English at the University of Iowa. She's a Louisville, KY native and received her BA in English at the University of Kentucky. Her work has appeared in Sarabande Books's Once a City Said anthology, and she was Sarabande's 2019 Flo Gault poetry prize recipient.