Widowsweave Day 10

Photos by Shalaka Kulkarni (except 2&3)

Freezing cold, windy, rock hard sand at 63rd St. Beach. Shalaka and I tried to draw in the frozen sand as best we could.  We got 4,750 lines by searching out sand veins, sand covered snow or scratching away as best we could.  We had to take a break in the middle to warm our fingers in the car.   One patch, it was hard to tell the drawn lines from the natural   ripples caused by the wind.

Day 9 - Widowsweave 43 Days

Today I thought about the existential dilemma of drawing lines for a symbolic number of people.  Does each line represent a person, a memory, artistic effort? How can we quantify a number which is in itself disputed to be anywhere from 1/4 to almost 3 times the chosen representation of 3 million.  This is the third time that I have had a stick which wanted to leave two parallel marks.  I have resisted counting both because counting each individual tally is important to the concept of the piece.  But what of today's branch, with which it was very difficult to avoid drawing two lines at a time (on some textures of sand)?  I decided that, as fate would have it, this would represent the difficulty in estimating an uncounted number of widows.  So, on the one hand, I was counting double at times, which felt like cheating, but on the other, I had to pay close attention in order to count only those lines that were clearly double, not just those that looked double from one angle - this caused me to slow down and think more.

 

A light snow was falling and became a little heavier as time progressed.  I was very quiet despite the wind - probably due to the breakwalls installed in Evanston.  I completed 20,000 lines with my light and balanced stick, perhaps 1000 of which were through doubles.  This was at the Greenwood St. Beach.

WidowsWeave Schedule for 1/25-1/31

WidowsWeave 43 Days began week two today.  Here's the schedule for the rest of the week:

Monday  1/25/10  -  2-4pm   Greenwood St. Beach, Evanston

Tuesday  1/26/10  -  Noon-2 pm   63rd St Beach, Chicago

Wednesday 1/27/10  -  9-11am    Rogers Ave. Beach  (7705 N. Eastlake Terrace)

Thursday    1/28/10  -  3:30-4:30pm    31st St. Beach (North end)

Friday  1/29/10  - 10:30am-Noon   Oakwood Beach  41st St. & Lakefront

Saturday  1/30/10  -  1-3pm   Montrose Beach (North from Beach house)

Sunday  1/31/10  -  1-3pm  Greenwood St. Beach, Evanston

Contact: consciousv@gmail.com

WidowsWeave: Day 8

Today was a wonderful thaw, 45 degrees with a south wind, the remainder of the lowest low pressure front to ever hit the West coast.  It was overcast with some mist, but it didn't rain on us.  Jaber and I did line for line while talking about the project, Iraq Foundation, Iraqi Mutual Aid Society...  This made counting lines harder, but the meaning more rewarding.  I had a heavy dull branch to draw with, so we switched off once, then later took turns with the lighter, sharper branch.  We completed 16,500 lines and covered the entire end of the beach north of the concrete pier where we were observed by a dozen or so gulls.  Jaber also tried to teach me to say "Kevin draws lines in the sand to benefit widows in Iraq" in Arabic, but it is very hard - especially when trying to count lines.

WidowsWeave - First Week Results

WidowsWeave - 43 Days
Day  1- 16,400 lines
Day  2- 13,600 lines
Day  3- 17,050 lines
Day  4- 19,500 lines
Day  5- 12,000 lines
Day  6- 15,700 lines
Day  7- 15,300 lines

Total:  109,550 lines drawn in the sand

Previous Lines in the Sand:

   1000 -Original Performance 7/16/09
   2900 -29th Anniversary of the Iran-Iraq War
     800 -8th Anniversary of the Afghan War
14,078 -with Core Project, Body Rewired and Jaber Alturfee
  4,362 -on Veteran's Day (number of US troops killed in Iraq)
 23,140 - Total

Total WidowsWeave: Lines in the Sand lines drawn:

  133,690 lines
lines remaining: 2,866,310

WidowsWeave Day 7 - Ohio St Beach

15,300 lines

Today was warm with only light drizzle for a part of the time.  I was not distracted by the weather at all but rather by the free parking I had found.   It annoyed me that the syntax of the sign left a small doubt in my mind as to whether or not I would get towed.  The lingering doubt filled the void left by the lack of bad weather, causing me to think of Solzhenietsyn's Gulag Archipelago  and our ability to occupy the mind under whatever are  the circumstances.

WidowsWeave: Day 6

Day 6, 1/22/10 - Howard Street Beach. Low 30s, almost calm.
Little monumental sculptures existing on the beach made for a mysterious memorial today while I drew lines around them.

15,700 lines today, though again some were no more that marks in the wet sand or frozen surface.  This time it was more because of the conditions - the top layer of sand was all clumpy and underneath it was frozen, and the end of the stick was curved oddly.  Clear lines were hard to make and caused me to wonder about the number of widows.  When there are so many, some conditions make it impossible to count accurately - dangerous regions, unstable buildings, disease, populations on the move.  For me, the count is almost perfect, but the marks are often unclear.  Someone else looking at the beach couldn't tell how many marks there were.

WidowsWeave: Day 5

1/21/10 WidowsWeave Day 5 - 31st St. Beach, 30 degrees, 20mph East wind, freezing rain. 12,000 lines. Lines in the sand have become tallies, and tallies have become mechanical divets due to the awful weather and helped by the little twist at the end of the branch I was using.

 

In the crusty snow, some of the lines are stabs, some are cuts, some barely make a mark.

 

This day was more about endurance than memory, survival above commemoration.  Sheet Ice formed on my right side where the rain had frozen on my hood.  The camera, wrapped in plastic and mounted under a shelter, still got rain on the lens which stopped the lens cover from closing till this morning.

The last thousand lines, a police car perched on the access road to see what kind of person would be out there doing whatever.

WidowsWeave: Day 4

1/20/10 WidowsWeave: Day 4 at Foster Beach, 30 degrees, 12mph East wind.  19,500 lines across the entire beach. No one asked anything today.  Very few people out at this part of the trail in this weather.  One couple with a dog heading to the dog beach.  A few runners went by on the bike path.

Widowsweave Schedule 1/21-1/24

Widowsweave continues to draw lines and tally 430,000 lines by February 28th as part of a durational art performance to raise awareness  of the 3 million widows in Iraq.

The following is the schedule for the rest of this week:

Thursday 1/21/10   11:30am-1:30pm
31st Street Beach (careful - it's a Right turn that looks like you are going into the off ramp, but there's a two-lane entry to beach parking just past the off ramp.

Friday 1/22/10 12noon-2pm  Howard St Beach

Saturday 1/23/10  9am-11am  Ohio St Beach.

Sunday  1/24/10  1;3-3;30pm  Leone Beach, Touhy and Lakeshore

WidowsWeave: Day 3 of 43

Today was a beautiful day for January, sunny and calm around 30 degrees F.   I completed 17,050 lines today and collected twenty or so new sticks and branches for drawing lines from the trees around Montrose Harbor.

The sad indicator when drawing so many lines, is that doing lines quickly and efficiently becomes the goal.  Even counting efficiently is important for two reasons:  one, it helps keep the count accurate, and two, it keeps the numbers from racing though my head in bed at night.  I started counting 1,2,3 for the tens column, not even counting each line.  The rhythm of drawing the lines makes it so that I just know when the next ten comes up.  This way I can count to 40 for 400.  But what does it say about a war where up to 100,000 died and 400,000 were injured in 43 days!  And what about all the widows who are struggling from 30 years and 3 war in Iraq.

First Two Days

Mary Valentine

16,400 lines drawn by 5 people on January 17th for the 19th Anniversary of the bombing  of Baghdad, marking the start of the Persian Gulf War (Operation Desert Storm).  Greenleaf Ave. beach, Loyola Park, Chicago Il

Kevin draws 13,600 lines on January 18th, 2010

South Blvd beach, Evanston, Il, USA

Schedule for 1/18-1/20

WidowsWeave will be drawing lines in the sand to raise awareness of the situation and number of Iraqi Widows

Monday, January 18, 2010
12 noon-2pm
South Blvd Beach,
South Blvd & lakefront
Evanston, Il
1/2 mile East of South Blvd stop on Purple Line

Tuesday, January 19th
1-3pm
Montrose Beach
Montrose Beach House & Lakefront
Chicago

Wednesday, January 20th
1-3pm
Foster Beach
Foster Ave. & Lakefront

more to come.

Today, January 17th was successful with five participants completing 16,600 lines.
The goal is 430,000 lines in 43 days by February 28th (the length of the Persian Gulf War, and roughly equivalent to deaths and injuries incurred by Iraq as reported at the time).
Total goal is 3,000,000 lines by January 17, 2011

New Performances Jan 17-Feb 30, 2010

                                                                   Photo: Susan Kwon 2009

Dear friends and concerned artists,

Performances start Tomorrow, January 17th at 2-4pm at Greenleaf Ave. (Loyola Park) beach in Rogers Park, Chicago. (7000N at Lakefront, two blocks North of Morse El stop on the Red line).
Please come by and show support for Iraqi Widows.

Look for a new location schedule each week at www.birddenoftruth.blogspot.com until new website is up.

Kevin Valentine will be performing Widows:Lines in the Sand daily from January 17th - February 28* to raise awareness of the continuing hardships faced by Iraqi widows.  He will attempt, solo or with help from interested citizens (you all), to draw an average of 10,000 lines a day for a total of 430,000 lines in the sand. This will be done at area beaches and other locations whenever possible. The goal is 3 million lines by this time next year.

A line in the sand represents a boundary, a limit.  Thus far and no farther.  How many times do we redraw that line?  There are up to 3 million Iraqi widows from almost 30 years of violence, war and sanctions, sectarian violence and turmoil.  Kevin is dedicating his MFA thesis, and most of the year prior and following, to raising awareness about the lack of basic necessities such as clean water, food and the desperation which follows a lack of resources and support for these women and their children in Iraq, in refugee camps and even for refugees in the US.  There will also be many fundraising activities.**

If you want to help, you can come out and draw lines, you can tell others about this work and you can donate to worthy causes.
One of my biggest challenges is to find charities working with those most in need.  I will be putting up links to charities on an upcoming www.widowsweave.com website in the next couple of weeks.***

For now:
Please watch my blog: www.birddenoftruth.blogspot.com for updates.
Check out selected past performances at the birddenoftruth channel on Youtube, or on the blog above.
I will also be setting up a facebook page soon and other webpages.


In the meantime, you can contact me here at:
consciousv@gmail.com

Thanks to all for your support,
Kevin Valentine



*This marks the 19th anniversary of the coalition war on Iraq. Bombing began on January 17th and a cease fire was declared on February 28th in 1991. 

**I plan to have pledge sheets for line drawing (like running for a cause), artwork for sale with percentages going to charities. My thesis exhibition (late April- through May) will have a participatory element as well.  Look for these also on the upcoming website in the next few months. 

***If you want to donate now, you can donate to:
 The Iraq Foundation's Widow's Empowerment Project or
The Aftermath Project  War is Only Half the Story(specify that it is for the Widowsweave fund to support a future project in Iraq)
Please let me know if you donate, so that I can keep a running total!