annie wildey
  • Original paintings
  • Fine Art Prints
    • Wave Prints
    • big little skies prints
    • Urban Sublime
    • The Coastal Etching Portfolio
  • Time and Tide Catalog
  • Ornaments
  • Commissions
  • Cards
    • Cards
    • Studio Gift cards
  • About
    • About Annie
    • Connect
    • News >
      • Blog spotlight >
        • Blog Feed
      • Press
  • Original paintings
  • Fine Art Prints
    • Wave Prints
    • big little skies prints
    • Urban Sublime
    • The Coastal Etching Portfolio
  • Time and Tide Catalog
  • Ornaments
  • Commissions
  • Cards
    • Cards
    • Studio Gift cards
  • About
    • About Annie
    • Connect
    • News >
      • Blog spotlight >
        • Blog Feed
      • Press

out and about

Studio Journal
​news, exhibitions and other musings 

Join me on my travels

O-o-h Child

9/24/2020

0 Comments

 

Things are gonna get easier 

I was invited to participate in a show at the Velvet Mill, where I used to have a studio. The exhibition features work from local artists and reflects on the current crisis/pandemic, and is sponsored by ARC.

I wasn't sure I hav anything suitable, but one piece came to mind, from a few years back that was originally titled Loves Me, Loves Me Not, and was created to evoke the vulnerability and fragility of a child. 

Picture
Loves Me, Loves Me Not, 8x10in etching
Picture
Ooh Child - Detail of embellishment

I decided to embellish the print by adding a mask. After all we all have to adapt.  This will also be available  as an edition of giclee prints. All profits will be donated to Feeding America. But I felt I needed a different title and started to mull it over.

In the early hours of the morning, a time that I consistently wake these days with anxiety, I woke with the melody and words ‘O-o-h Child, things are gonna get easier’, in my head. A wonderful uplifting soulful song. I thought that’s it! it’s perfect for the piece and for the times.  Later that morning while drinking my coffee, I listened to the song by the Five Stairs Steps on YouTube, and searched for the lyrics to print out, and came across The New Yorker article by Amanda Petrusich.
Written November 7, 2016, days before the election, Amanda declared 'O-o-h Child' as the best song for soothing your election anxiety, and here we are 4 years later in darker and more treacherous times.  Reading the article further I learned that the song was released in the spring of 1970. A tumultuous and desperate time in America, that feels in such parallel with were we are today.

Picture
The Five Stairsteps Photograph by Gilles Petard/Redferns/Getty
Picture
“Nixon had recently ordered American forces in Vietnam to push into Cambodia, threatening to widen a war that already seemed uncontainable. Four unarmed Kent State students were murdered and another nine injured by Ohio National Guardsmen while peacefully protesting the directive; additional demonstrations soon followed. The Beatles had broken up. Postal workers, on strike over low wages and treacherous conditions, had stopped delivering the U.S. mail. I imagine the ground felt tenuous, unsteady, strange”   
Please do read Amanda’s piece in full here. You'll learn a little about this wonderful family of singers .

It’s a reminder that in some of the darkest times we crave a salve and that salve often comes from the Arts – music, poetry, literature, film, art, and nature.  Starting my mornings with music is one way I can dissolve the anxiety of the night and start my day a little lighter.  I’m pleased to be reunited with this 70’s classic.

You can listen to the Five Stair Steps sing O-o-h Child here 

I'm also waking up to this tune
A lovely Day by Bill Withers, give it a listen, it'll put a skip in your step!
​

​

O-o-h Child 
is an embellished giclee fine art print

she is available in 4 sizes  11x14 up to 28x36in
starting  at $50 - $500
Picture


20% of the profits from print sales will go to Feeding America.
1 in 7 kids in America struggle with hunger.


Each one will be hand embellished with gold petal leaves on the flower and a gold mask. But you can get creative too and customize the mask with polka dots, stripes, flowers, words like vote, peace, whatever you like have fun - let me know!
​
Shop - O-o-h Child Print

Here are the Song Lyrics


O-o-h Child
Five Stairsteps

Ooh child
Things are gonna get easier
Ooh child
Things'll get brighter

Ooh child
Things are gonna get easier
Ooh child
Things'll get brighter

Some day, yeah
We'll put it together and we'll get it undone
Some day
When your head is much lighter
​

Some day, yeah
We'll walk in the rays of a beautiful sun
Some day
When the world is much brighter

Ooh child
Things are gonna be easier
Ooh child
Things'll be brighter

Ooh child
Things are gonna be easier
Ooh child
Things'll be brighter

Some day, yeah
We'll put it together and we'll get it undone
Some day
When your head is much lighter

Some day, yeah
We'll walk in the rays of a beautiful sun
Some day
When the world is much brighter

Some day, some day, some day, some day yeah
We'll put…


0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Annie is a British painter and printmaker and lover of the sea.

    ​
    Stay Connected
    sign up for my e-news

    ​

    Archives

    April 2023
    March 2023
    September 2022
    August 2022
    June 2022
    January 2022
    September 2021
    July 2021
    May 2021
    February 2021
    November 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    April 2020
    January 2020
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    October 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    November 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    October 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015

    Categories

    All
    A Creative Life
    Exhibition News
    In The Studio
    New In The Shop
    New Paintings
    Open Studios
    Personal Essays
    Workshops

    RSS Feed


About AiR
About Annie

News
Commissions

privacy policy 
cookie policy 


anniewildeystudio, - 32 Friendship Street, Westerly, RI 02891  e: [email protected]  © COPYRIGHT 2022. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.