Cleo Pawson

Button Blanket for my Back
mixed media wall sculpture

"My Backless Dress" is built onto an orange "E-Z Tracer" which lights my x-ray. I choose this to symbolize an idea in western culture that "we" are able to construct a perfect definition and fit people into it — like having your original on the "E-Z Tracer" and making copy after copy. I've found being put on the "E-Z Tracer" is far more painful and crippling then my disability is. Vital parts of my identity must be made invisible so I can be fit into a definition made by someone else.

When my "Rods" were installed in 1969, I was told that I'd be "fixed." I am a reluctant "Cyborg" because no one asked me if I wanted this "fixing." I was 12. I never did feel "fixed." I'd look at my scarred and still crooked back in the mirror, and I'd feel like a "normal impersonator." I could never do the impersonation, no matter how hard I tried. By 1989 I was so exhausted that I was given the definition "Disabled".

But then, when I said I was Disabled, there would be people who would question what it is that is "wrong" with me. They could not see that my "assistive devices" had been built right into my body, so that I look cosmetically straighter. My Chronic Pain is invisible to everyone. Now I have made "My Backless Dress" to speak for me. Plug it in. Turn it on. See beneath my skin.

I have just survived yet another "E-Z Tracer" ordeal — the 23 page re-application for my BC Disability Benefits. I am ready to become beyond naked so I can speak about what you cannot see.

This "Debutantes" dress is decorated with the unique imprints from my own Healing Hands. Art is how I claim my own inner territory. Nature can be clear-cut, but it grows back with Beauty. This is what inspires me. My Art celebrates the sacred weeds that grow through the pavement. I am Broken. I am Healed. I am Beautiful. I am Deformed. I live with my Chronic Pain. I am gifted with my Creativity. My back is my Transformational Butterfly. I love my back, just as it is, Rods and All. I become weaker in my body, and at the same time I become spiritually stronger. I am living a mystery which I don't have words for, so I make my Art about this.

"Dream from Age 11"
Gouache Paint on Watercolour Paper
1997, 16" x 20"

List of Art

"Self Portrait"
Gouache Paint on Watercolour Paper
2003, 18" x 18"

"My Backless Dress"
Mixed Media Wall Sculpture
2003, 57" x 22"

"Button Blanket for my Back"
Fabric, Beads, Buttons, Shells
1999-2001, 35" x 56"

"Going into the Light"
Gouache Paint and Watercolour Paper
1998-1999, 16" x 20"

"Dream from Age 11"
Gouache Paint on Watercolour Paper
1997, 16" x 20"