The Masks We Wear by Day

Abstract

31 The commencement of the COVID-19 global pandemic caused me to refl ect on my childhood art practice. During lockdown, I spent the lonely days at home in self-isolation perusing my early drawings. As a young artist, I created art to reexperience my life (Dewey, 1934). As an adolescent, I read the popular classic called Th e Prophet by the author and artist Kahlil Gibran (1923). One poetic essay has a line, “Your joy is your sorrow unmasked” (Gibran, 1923, p. 35). Gibran’s message about life’s lessons and essential truths has a philosophical twist. One cannot experience a sense of pure joy without experiencing the contrasting emotion of deep sorrow, I determined.