Lacrimae rerum*
The tears of things.
In the visual poetry of tears is the entirely personally intimate yet universal human experience of emotion. The teardrop shape is an icon of our culture that we associate with sadness even though tears are provoked through diverse emotional experiences.
Tears are the evidence that we are human.
Tears are the physical manifestation of emotion and the embodiment of our human ability to communicate through visual cues. I am compelled to dissect the teardrop and separate it from its human home to better understand the tears in things. Through collagraph prints, Lacrimae rerum isolates the teardrop into a flattened, enlarged shape strewn with dissected bits of clothing. As though we are looking through a giant microscope we see the trappings of our human, emotional, experience. Sunt Lacrimae Rerum. There are tears in things.
Sunt Lacrimae Rerum is attributed to Virgil’s Aeneid (29-19 BCE), translating to: there are tears for things : there is pity for misfortune : there are tears in things : life is tragic*
*"Sunt Lacrimae Rerum."Â Merriam-Webster.com. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 1 Sept. 2017
