A Source of Light

mk Eagle

Interview by L. Valena

What did you respond to?

I was responding to what looked like a painting of a woman, in what I would call sort of classic prairie garb. My mom’s a quilter and it reminded me of that classic Sunbonnet Sue pattern- the bonnet and skirt and the apron over the skirt. She was holding out a lantern, which was a really magnificent light source on the piece. That was the thing that I was drawn to— how that was throwing light on everything else.

Great, and what happened next?

I was just really drawn to that light source. I kept opening it and not doing anything... and opening it and not doing anything. Looking at it, and thinking about the light. I’ve actually been moving lately, so I knew that I wouldn’t be able to do what I usually do- some new pattern and new folding and coloring and everything.

I had a stack of already colored papers, and I was picking out the warmest ones and thinking about getting those into some kind of a light source. Then I had migraines for a couple of days. When I have migraines, I get an aura. It’s sort of like a light source when you’re experiencing it, but also really bright lights can trigger migraines for me. So I thought about trying to do something sort of a little bit representing an aura.

The way I’ve seen it represented in other places is more like an animation or a video or something to do kind of the strobing and wiggling. I tried cutting up one of the papers, kind of in an accordion fashion, but I couldn’t attach it to anything that way, so I ended up bringing in even more pieces, which is weird for me. I don’t usually cut it up or use it for something else or repurpose it. Then I just sort of started gluing it, trying to get that wavy pattern. Which again was really different for me, because what I usually do is really precise, and I wasn’t measuring anything or trying to come up with good angles.

So the first one I made was like, “hmm, I don’t know about this one.” The second one seemed a little bit better. I was just trying to let myself be uncomfortable with it, because usually as soon as I make a mistake, I just crumple it up and start over. So instead I just let this imperfect thing happen.

Then I held it up and realized that I wanted an actual light source involved. I started just cutting diamonds with an exacto knife, and holding it up to the lamp that I had just put together because that was the best light source that I had.

Have you tried to visualize these patterns that you see when you get migraines before? Is that something that you had explored previously?

No. This was my first time trying to do that. They’ve been pretty consistent, but the experience kind of varies. Sometimes it just lasts for half an hour and doesn’t really build into anything, but sometimes I get these really spectacular full circles or semi circles. It’s hard to explain to someone who’s never had a migraine what that kind of aura is like. Even for some people who have just the headache aspect, or headache and nausea. As I said, the way it’s usually represented is with some kind of video that tries to simulate that, “I’m sort of going blind” feeling. It was weird to try to represent that in a static way.

Is something like this what you would see when your eyes are closed, or in the dark?

Not exactly. There’s something close, which I think I’ve heard other people say they experience: sometimes if you’re in the shower and you close your eyes, you start to see sort of a circle burn itself into the insides of your eyelids. But strobing is really the best word for this. That’s the way that it sort of moves across to your field of vision. When it starts, there is always this really disorienting feeling, like you are going blind or can’t see quite properly. There’s something that hasn’t quite bloomed into the full aura happening in your field of vision. You can’t turn and look at it, there’s nothing to really focus on. Even if you experience it across both eyes, and it feels like it’s more over to one side or the other. Something about the motion, combined with the sort of starburst rainbow kind of light is really different from what you usually would see when you just close your eyes, I think.

There’s a really beautiful quality to it. If there were a way to choose to have this experience, to know when it was going to happen, and plan it out. Do in a time of your day that you don’t have to drive or read or any of these things- it is really beautiful. But the fact that it always happens without your consent and you don’t know how long it will last- that’s the scary, weird part about it.

Can you talk about how this relates to the rest of your work?

It feels very different from what I usually do. Obviously it has the elements of it, because I literally cut up what I usually do to make this. But I usually work with kind of a compulsive precision and very tiny fine details. People react very strongly with, “how in the world do you do that?” So it was very weird for me to just sort of try gluing some stuff on some other stuff without using a ruler or sketching anything out ahead of time. It was very uncomfortable, and actually after I submitted it I was like, “uh, I should have worked on that a lot longer, or done something different and this is terrible.” I think I was reacting really strongly just from my own compulsive point of view, because it isn’t exact. But that’s that’s sort of interesting- I’m kind of enjoying the line with the discomfort part.

Do you have any advice for another artist approaching this project for the first time?

Usually my impulse is just to start something right away, or respond right away. I’m happy that I took a few days, kind of made it rattle around in my brain. I’m glad that I made myself open and close it, open and close it. So, I think if the next artist is someone who also usually just jumps right in, maybe sitting with it for a minute is a good idea. But also, like I said, I’m just really into this whole discomfort thing. So I think you know if you start working on something and it feels weird, definitely explore that.

Call Number: M33VA | M34VA.eaA

mk Eagle has been folding small squares of paper into even smaller squares for over twenty years. If she isn’t doing something with her hands, she probably isn’t paying attention to you. She lives in Louisville, KY with two cats who do not respect her artistic process.