Patti Durr
Words: 559
[Art Review]

Pamela Witcher is this week's featured artist.



Triptych self-portrait of Pamela Witcher.

(Left frame: Black and white photograph of Pamela Witcher's face in front of a paneled wood background.
Middle frame: Color photograph of the artist's full length shadow on an edge of a stream with rocks placed as if a her shadow were wearing a bikini.
Last frame: Color photo of a birch tree trunk with an organic pattern in the bark that look like large eyes. It is as if the tree were watching the viewer.)

This self-taught Deaf artist is from a Deaf family in Montreal, Quebec, and fluent in LSQ (Langue des Signes Quebecoise), ASL, French, and English. Her works have strong feminine and Deaf View/Image Art (De'VIA) themes and motifs. Many of Witcher's pieces feature figures with bald heads and no hair. The bald heads are similar to the Deaf people featured in Chuck Baird's large mural in the Gallaudet University cafeteria as well as many other De'VIA artists' works. This choice is often utilized to emphasize the universalism of human beings, while also giving them an alien and foreign appearance.



The piece above is entitled "Hitler, Bell and Ling in disguise." As with Witcher's other works, the Deaf individuals are indicated by the lack of ears. In this piece the Deaf individuals appear to be indigenous people representing a natural and organic state, emphasized by earthy tones. The Deaf woman looks at the menacing faces coming out of a fog like cloud and shrinks away; whereas, the Deaf male figure stares straight ahead blankly as if numb and unaware. The centerpiece of the work are three green faces with elongated ears. They look as if they were gremlins or evil spirits. The shading of the green is reminiscent of the Institute green used in hospitals and residential schools as it was attributed to having a "calming effect."

We know by the title of the artwork that the green faces represent historical figures who promoted eugenics or tried to wipe out Deaf individuals, culture, and natural signed languages--Hitler having passed the Prevention of Hereditary Diseased Offspring law, Alexander Graham Bell having pushed for the banning of ASL in Deaf education, the firing of Deaf teachers, and the prevention of Deaf to Deaf marriages, and Daniel Ling of Montreal, who developed the Ling method for speech and emphasized aural rehabilitation. The upper right corner indicates an angel with an expression of concern and shock; yet, with hand behind back indicating s/he is helpless and cannot be of aid. In the left hand top corner there is a watching face in the cloud, indicating a divine figure bearing witness to the oppression of a natural people.

This resistance De'VIA piece serves as a pictorial testimony of the archenemies of Deaf Natural Signed Language communities and the perseverance and the persistence of Deaf people as part of a divine plan.

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Patti Durr teaches in the Department of Cultural and Creative Studies at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf.