Laurianne Simon

"Some time ago, I promised I would always get out of bed in the morning saying, “Yes! My feet are on the ground.”

My shoes make me feel more grounded; they bring me back to my roots. This is kind of strange actually, because most of the time old shoes are just something we grow out of. But when I look at my shoes, they neither seem too small, nor too old. They are just a little bit damaged. There are marks from the times when I have fallen; there are scuffs and stains from having walked; there are little pieces of the fields stuck in them from when I last went running. Sand is lodged in the gaps of my soles. Yet my shoes have kept the shape of my

feet—and I have a trace of every place I have been. Mentally, I can walk back to every footprint I have ever left. Sometimes I let these memories play themselves out in front of me; I could almost watch them as if they were an ocean. I wish I could travel through them, bring them to life again, re-live them, tell their stories again, write them out—and have them take note of my trials and tribulations, but also my joys, and my laughter; infuse them with this particular form of desire that keeps me moving… forward. This abundant desire to live, and to paint, which drives me to apprehend the world around me, and whatever it is within me that moves me so deeply. 

Entirely focused, my movements are like a dance. I am in freefall; it is a frenetic dive into the surface of the painting, as if the canvas were quicksand that could swallow me up.''

Laurianne Simon. 2015