3 Questions for Michele

What was your process for creating this work?

I looked around my yard at scrap metal, rocks and clay pieces (made by my daughter as a child), rearranged them, added paint, took many pictures, and added captions. Acceptance nudged the process to continue as I thought about images of war and of art commingling on electronic devices.

What is the significance of the medium and genre you chose?

I am 100% an amateur photographer, using my iPhone to point and shoot with very little post-editing. Although the corporeal experience is minimal in this visual digital medium, I find satisfaction in the results as they can be shared so easily with other humans.

What is the significance of the work to you?

I am acting from a position of privilege in creating concept pieces about war in the safety of my American backyard. In the film This Much I Know to be True, Nick Cave creates a series of ceramics depicting events in the life of the devil, with whom he identifies with. I was not identifying with my War/Dragon subjects as I was posing and photographing them, but perhaps as an American taxpayer I should.

Michele Worthington’s poetry has appeared in Unlost journal and SandScript and in a flower pot as part of the 2022 Tucson Haiku Hike. Her photography appeared once before in Harpy Hybrid Review. She has quit her job in healthcare and plans to use those previously waged hours to write more poems with hopefully self-significance as the payment.