Lockdown Project
'Shadow of my Former Self' is a body of work by printmaker and Society member Sheila de Rosa MSDC. It will be featured in 'Women Writing Lockdown' at the House of Commons, Westminster on 28th June 2023.
During the first phase of lockdown I experienced a new feeling of being in nature. Born in the city of London I had a healthy disrespect for the countryside – but I now live in a little Buckinghamshire village replete with a canal and reservoirs. Walking was our only pastime and I did walk, but most of all I looked. I saw so many colours and shapes and natural things going on that I had never noticed before. And depending on the time of day, I saw myself, as a shadow, transported into that new environment. Obviously, I took as many photos as I could of my beautifully distorted shape as it caressed the water’s edge or floated on the sludgy green, stagnant waters.
However, shadows are places devoid of light and that seemed too depressing for the uplifting feelings I got from these walks – so I inverted the images and made me full of light, which was more in keeping with the sensations I was getting from this previously unappreciated world around me.
This body of work, produced during the stultifying restrictions of lockdown in 2020 became three dimensional and articulated the unique mood of change that was a new kind of domesticity. I am delighted to say that this body of work will be featured at the launch of 'Women Writing Lockdown' at the House of Commons, Westminster on 28th June 2023.