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Shadows Love Me

November 25, 2022/ Rachel Mulder

Circus girl cuddling small grey horse, pink and gray
Fear Circus, 2022
White on black drawing of two headless figures made mostly of limbs
Stone Dance, 2022
Pink and blue gel pen drawing on white surface of two beings kissing, the top one with a bright blue head like a robin’s egg and moth-like features.
Robins Egg, 2022
Line drawing on black surface of multi-figure scene of beings hanging onto each other in a windy field at night.
Night Field, 2022
Pink green and brown line drawing on black surface of a snail-like creature clutching a nest and floppy human skin.
Larval Embrace, 2022
Pink and green line drawing on white surface of a strange figure cuddling a small shadow horse in the grass.
Curious Nurturer, 2022
Pink, teal and pale orange drawing on black surface of three crescent-headed beings behind a bird-like deity reflected in reverse above them.
Nervous Worship, 2022
Brightly colored line drawing on white surface of three surreal writhing figures drawing on a floor in front of a fancy pointed window.
Playtime, 2022
Pale pink, blue and orange drawing on black surface under a cloudy sunset sky with a surreal being opening their glowing chest and face.
Untitled, 2022
Neon and grey line drawing on black surface of a vague person seated on a bed, looking in a dazzling mirror at alluring, bright person with centipede features.
Centipede Message, 2022

Artist Statement

Love letters to my past and future selves
A funeral for the rodent you found in the backyard
The clump of trees that protected you from the airplanes

‌

The time blood appeared on your thigh from you-don’t-know-where
and shocked you into tears next to your favorite boulder

‌

You can’t draw the lamb
Trust that the lines will follow you

‌

I stole the title for this body of work from my three-year-old niece. She was initially afraid of the shadows created by the canopy her mom placed over her bed. My sister-in-law was about to take it down when she said, “never mind, shadows love me!” These neon gel pen drawings were first exhibited in Portland, Oregon, at a café called Albina Press, in the Fall of 2022. I was able to neglect the details of an Artist Statement and hide them behind the poem italicized above. Drawing is my way of sharing vulnerability that I am historically too afraid to express with words and the reason that I am a visual artist in the first place.

The beings depicted inhabit this void of a world where specifics and hard truths remain unseen. When I was young, I wished to be non-participatory, a fly on the wall. I had no desire to be active in the human world because I was too afraid to be a person. When I discovered my neurodivergence as an adult, every interaction I had as a young person suddenly snapped into place. These drawings are helping me to learn how to exist as an embodied vessel, not just an empty shape surrounded by what I am not. These beings emerge from an unseen realm to remind me (or you, or you) to become our own shapes.

Gel pens offer a decisive finality. I must acquiesce to the chance of “making a mistake” and trust the lines as they delicately emerge. When I sit down to work, I may have a vague idea of a body shape I want to draw, or a feeling I am soaking in, but the lines often surprise me as they wind around the strangers I meet on the page.

Looking at the drawings, it’s hard to know if the interactions are nurturing or violent, whether they know one another intimately or invite dread in the other. As these beings contort around the truths that are too sharp to say out loud, they invite the viewer to tell a story to themselves. Somehow our guts recognize it anyway.

Rachel Mulder Headshot

Rachel Mulder lives in Portland, Oregon, with her two cats, Opal and Tomasina. She was born in rural Wisconsin, and when she was small, she spent a lot of time sitting in the grass staring, obsessing about animals, watching cartoons, and peeling her skin off. Now she makes drawings using a variety of media that often yield printmakerly textures—residual effects from earning her BFA in Printmaking at Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design in 2007. Encouraging others to create/exist sincerely is a parallel passion of hers that braids itself into her visual work. Her website: www.rachelmulderart.com

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Genre Archive

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Friday Lunch Blog

Friday Lunch! A serving of contemporary essays published the second Friday of every month.

Today’s course:

Glitch Wisdom

May 12, 2023/in Blog / KJ McCoy
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Lessons on Getting Paid: My First Year as a Freelance Writer

April 14, 2023/in Blog / EJ Saunders
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How to Kill a Cat, or How to Prepare for CATastrophe

March 10, 2023/in Blog / Meghan McGuire
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Midnight Snack

Take a bite out of these late night obsessions.

Tonight’s bites:

The Secret Histories of Everywhere

June 2, 2023/in Midnight Snack / Brian Lynn
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Into the Linguistic Rabbit Hole

May 5, 2023/in Midnight Snack / paparouna
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Dancing into Detachment

April 7, 2023/in Midnight Snack / Robert Kirwin
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Amuse-Bouche

Little bites every third Friday to whet your appetite!

Today’s plate:

LitDish: Ten Questions With Isabel Quintero

May 26, 2023/in Amuse-Bouche / Interviewed by Gail Vannelli
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Chop Day

May 19, 2023/in Amuse-Bouche / Hannah Felt Garner
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Litdish: Ten Questions With David A. Robertson

April 28, 2023/in Amuse-Bouche / Interviewed by Gail Vannelli
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School Lunch

An occasional Wednesday series dishing up today’s best youth writers.

Today’s slice:

I’ve Stayed in the Front Yard

May 12, 2021/in School Lunch, School Lunch 2021 / Brendan Nurczyk
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A Communal Announcement

April 28, 2021/in School Lunch, School Lunch 2021 / Isabella Dail
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Seventeen

April 14, 2021/in School Lunch, School Lunch 2021 / Abigail E. Calimaran
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Word From the Editor

Our contributors are diverse and the topics they share through their art vary, but their work embodies this mission. They explore climate change, family, relationships, poverty, immigration, human rights, gun control, among others topics. Some of these works represent the mission by showing pain or hardship, other times humor or shock, but they all carry in them a vision for a brighter world.

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