Emily van Lidth de Jeude

I've begun a new project!   One Solar Year is an observation of our shared, fragile, resilient humanity over the course of (surprise!) one solar year! I began the project at the previous winter solstice, and plan to write over a hundred poems before the next winter solstice, each inspired and combined with a portrait of wildness around my home. Our human experience isn't separate from the ecology around us; it's completely integral to it. The dewdrops, the haggard plants emerging from the snow, the wilting blossoms in the heat dome; they're part of our psyche, even when we don't notice them. I'm noticing them. One Solar Year is an Instagram project, which may or may not become a book in the future. If you'd like to follow it, go here: https://www.instagram.com/onesolaryear/  Thank you for your support. 🧡

Visual and film artist Lidia Patriasz paints the silhouette of my mother, Lyn van Lidth de Jeude, during a performance of my work, SuperMAMA, 2010. All the women who participated in this production were mothers; most were also visual artists or musicians, and these two were also preschool teachers. Photo by Adrian van Lidth de Jeude. As a teen, I never really thought about becoming a mother. Finding the elusive “true love” — yes! But not kids. I was going to find a man who was supportive of my political views (and would understand there is nothing actually “political” about equal rights), and spend my life busting up the patriarchy with gusto! Through the amazing art career I had planned, I was going to save us from climate change AND our degrading societal norms, by showing the world what absolute tools for the patriarchy we’ve been, and getting us out from under the shoe of the Man. Yeah. So… that didn’t go quite as planned. My man was not un supportive, he was just mild-man...