Oh Mary Don't You Weep

O Mary, don't you weep, don't you mourn / O Mary, don't you weep, don't you mourn / Pharaoh's army got drowned / O Mary, don't you weep

It is perhaps the hope that echoes throughout this song which makes it quite so heartbreaking. It has elements of longing ('If I could, I surely would..'), powerlessness, resistance ('people gonna rise..'), optimism ('Mary, don't you weep') and faith ('When I get to heaven'). 

The unification of old and new testament biblical passages is interesting. The song refers to Mary of Bethany, whose tears over her brother's death affected Jesus - "When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled." (John 11:33). However, this song encourages Mary not to weep; God is merciful and rewards his believers. Indeed, Jesus performed the impossible act and Lazarus was resurrected. The line repeated over and over references the old testament, and acts as a reminder to Mary, 'Pharaoh's army got drownded'. God protects people and punished enemies. Christianity was no doubt used by the slaves' oppressors to justify their actions and inspired the slaves to break free from their oppressors. The slaves align themselves with the children of Jesus, the chosen people. These beliefs, presented through O Mary Don't You Weep, provide great comfort and promise of redemption and salvation.

When I began to paint, I thought of the repetition of the command 'Mary don't you weep, don't you mourn'. I thought of all the times I have been told not to cry and how this only ever triggers an influx of tears. Yet I thought how comforting it is to be told not to cry, to be told all your problems will be resolved. I painted a woman on the verge of tears, head bowed with sadness. She turned out to be a very beautiful woman. The blue, the precious pigment, references another Mary in the Bible. The rapidity of the brush strokes, the fluidity of the paint try to evoke the fleeting, fluctuating emotions on the point of weeping and a sense of serenity in the face of despair.

Spirituals, Works Songs & Gospel

"the music was our history"

The songs I have been listening to this week possess incredible soul and beauty despite being born out of the most supreme ugliness. Leroi Jones writes how the black music tradition was shaped out of necessity: stripped of all other forms, music was the only means of expression which was unable to be controlled. Any cultural form which resulted in an artefact did not survive, yet the musical legacy from this period is incredibly strong. The sense of disconnection on all sides is heartbreaking. The slaves were torn away from Africa and taken to a radically different country and culture - 'the complete antithesis of the African's version of human existence'. However, any sense of Africa is immediately displaced amongst the new generations. They were Americans with no hope of assimilation, belonging to nowhere. This is a feeling that I think is echoed in Sometimes I Feel Like A Motherless Child. 

I have been thinking about the prevalence of bible passages within the spirituals, or 'sorrow songs'. The Christian religion was forced upon the slaves by their Western masters, and even though this is reflected in the songs' lyrics - there is still a duality to the message. The Christian ideals are not suited to the hardships faced by the slaves. The people were blinded their enslaver's own religious convictions and their focus on freedom and deliverance. The songs therefore, seem distressingly futile. However, these spirituals are not reworkings of biblical passages but an entirely new cultural arrangement; one that is very distinctly African-American.

This week I found it difficult to focus on one particular song due to the breadth of material I had before me. I found that the emotions I experienced when listening to these songs are more easily expressed through sketching while listening - formed through a very immediate connection to the music.

Down in the Valley

Down in the valley, the valley so low

Angels in Heaven know I love you

Build me a castle, forty feet high

Singing Down in the Valley, the lyric 'angels in heaven' made me imagine the land from far above, and I remembered being filled with wonder from seeing America for the first time out of the aeroplane window. The heightened perspective abstracted the land below me, creating fields of colour that stretched for hours and hours. Yet I felt disconnected and wistful: 

longing to be within the landscape, rather than to be gazing down upon it. Down in the Valley seems to have a yearning feel to it; it is at once content and melancholy. For me, looking down upon the valley holds a similar possibility for contemplation.

First Song

Mary, Mary, quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
With silver bells, and cockle shells,
And pretty maids all in a row.

Speed, bonnie boat, like a bird on the wing,

Onward! the sailors cry;

Carry the lad that's born to be King

Over the sea to Skye

Loud the winds howl, loud the waves roar,

Thunderclouds rend the air;

Baffled, our foes stand by the shore,

Follow they will not dare.

Collages exploring the process of remembering the first songs that were sung to me as a child. My early memories are filled with old English nursery rhymes and lullabies sung to me by my mother. I have strong associations of these songs to the colours and fabrics of the house I was born in, the pink of my bedroom, the awful patterned curtains, the softness of my grandmother's knitting... I particularly remember hearing the Skye Boat song - a scottish folk song - and it transporting me away to foreign, wild landscapes away from the safety of my own surroundings. The process of creating these montages of reminiscent imagery forced me to fragment together the essence of these childhood emotions. The undertaking of a collage, like piecing together a memory, is a negotiation. Yet it is still difficult to know for sure what is real and what is pure nostalgia.