on isolation and transformation:
i
feel like the year 2020 is just going to be a placeholder in my life for a long time. It's like an overflowing shoebox full of letters, letters holding so much grief and loss and surreal shared experiences and experiences lonely with no mate at all, welling up, pouring ink and water and tears. running across the floor, spilling feelings and fears and anger both righteous and messy.
l
etters like that are so heavy, the shoebox can't hold them. But I can't hold the shoebox so there it sits. Letters to myself "don't forget". Letters to myself "don't remember". Letters I'll never send to people who shouldn't read them, because the point was in the writing, not the sending. It's easier to do the writing than to do the feeling. And it's easier to do the feeling than to do the healing.
y
ou have to start somewhere, so I do. With one letter, one letter to me. And since I know my audience, I know she likes a story, with none of the sting taken out but all of the sweet left in. And she'd rather have it all colors and sounds than lines on a page. And I sit to write/listen/taste/feel it.
And I heal a little
Every time I read it
Astropsychonautical
by Roxy Tocin (2020)
watercolor on cold press paper
A painting that started as a meme, I couldn't get the image out of my head.
I realized that it was probably because the lyric it's based on :
"...in slow motion, I feel like an astronaut in the ocean"
wasn't sticking with me because I feel a connection to that song,
but because it's such a great description of dissociation.
I use music to understand everything,
and music informs my artistic hand
as frequently as it dances with
me through the rest of my day
This is the soundtrack of this collection:
every brush stroke and minute
i m /
by Roxy Tocin (2021)
alcohol ink and acrylic paint marker on sealed canvas
"There are many different ways things could implode.
An implosion is simply the opposite of an explosion.
In an explosion, matter and energy fly outward, but, in an implosion, matter and energy collapse inward.
All implosions will need some sort of pressure from the outside pushing in to cause the object to collapse.
So in short, implosions are caused by having a greater pressure on the outside of an object than on the inside." [1]
/ e x
by Roxy Tocin (2021)
alcohol ink and acrylic paint marker on sealed canvas
" Implosion is a key part of the gravitational collapse of large stars, which can lead to the creation of supernovae, neutron stars and black holes.
In the most common case, the innermost part of a large star [...] stops burning and without this source of heat, the forces holding electrons and protons apart are no longer strong enough to do so.
The core collapses in on itself exceedingly quickly, and becomes a neutron star or black hole; the outer layers of the original star fall inwards and may rebound off the newly created neutron star (if one was created), creating a supernova." [2]
Coming Undone
by Roxy Tocin (2021)
digital
I remind myself
again
again
again
again
how caterpillars
have to turn into goo
let go
of all of it
and turn into a puddle
it's less comforting than it used to be
I didn't realize how far I had left to dissolve
digital
by Roxy Tocin (2021)
The Afterglow
Just
Be
Where
You
Are
Dandelion
by Roxy Tocin (2021)
digital
a celebration of the sweet, the surreal, the absurd, and laughing like you really mean it.
I'm so very grateful
that a robot brings
my friends to me
at any hour I'm awake
Starry Eyed
by Roxy Tocin (2021)
digital asset series
so many names for water, but
my favorite doesn't have a sound,
just a feeling, like home and rest
I always come back to the water. I come to the water when I need to cry or need to stop crying, I come to the water when I need to choose or I need to stop worrying over a choice. I have transformed in and through water so many times in my life. This repurposed found water tank was turned into a soak and splash pool. Filled with a river rock bottom and deep sulfur well water from beneath it, Fingerprint mural around it, a protected pool of healing water.
You can see the stars from it.
You can be the stars in it
You can be water in it
You can just be in it
You can just be
Naiad's Amulet
by Roxy Tocin (2021)
latex paint mural on found water tank & corrugated metal wall
Naiad's Amulet
by Roxy Tocin (2021)
digitized mural unwrapping
Burst
by Roxy Tocin (2020)
watercolor and marker on mixed media paper
a self portrait in abstract
by Roxy Tocin (2021)
pyrography on rough Box Elder slice
Bleed and Bloom
Fingerprints
by Roxy Tocin (2021)
pyrography installation
on Pinon stump
I spent so much of the year 2020 trying to process what was happening around and inside me in so many concentric circles.
I walked the same winding paths over and over, then I started to draw them. I had been listening to a song about fingerprints that was about grief and healing for a while before this piece found its stump.
While I was in the process of burning this piece, a dear friend visited, and told me a story that I absolutely adored, about fingerprints that were reminders of joy and the good stuff.
That's when this piece found its name, and the rest of the ones to follow would be Fingerprints to me.
The human part of being human in balance, the grief and the joy of memories and sometimes the ones that are all mixed together.
Sometimes, especially those ones.
p.s.
by Roxy Tocin (2021)
watercolor on cold press paper
{Syn Aesthetic series #2: im/ex}
proud to introduce my second piece in the
syn aesthetic series, it takes me a VERY long time to draw music, but it's always rewarding.
I played im/ex on loop for
the duration of this painting.
Every song is in it.
If you can't think of what to do,
just put your records on
im/ex is a collection of works by Roxy Tocin, inspired by healing through art and music
break rules / make art
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