Tiny Coronavirus Stories – Page 4 – Artists & Climate Change

April 8, 2020April 7, 2020

Tiny Coronavirus Stories: ‘As long as she is there I cannot touch her’

Twenty-five days. It has been twenty-five days since I came home. Twenty-five days ago I came home to my mother, but I cannot hug her. She works in the hospital, the ER in fact. And as long as she is there I cannot touch her. She comes home in tears, exhausted, and fearful that she may infect us… and I cannot console her. I can only hope for the day I can hold her and she will know that it will be alright. Twenty-five more days and I may be able to hug her. But we must stay home.
— Iliana Ramon (Fairmont, Minnesota)

April 7, 2020April 7, 2020

Tiny Coronavirus Stories: ‘The third narrator is practicing her lines’

The narrator of my life insisted on saying, “And from that point on, everything went quickly down hill.”
She was replaced.
The second narrator insisted on saying, “One day and then the next, in dismal succession.”
She was replaced.
These narrators think they know everything! The third narrator is practicing her lines. She is learning to say, “We are staying at home. We are washing our hands. We are playing our part.”
— Karen Elias (Lock Haven, Pennsylvania)

April 5, 2020April 5, 2020

Tiny Coronavirus Stories: ‘The song of a blackbird emerges’

It’s Thursday. Is it Thursday? It IS Thursday. I have lived an entire day in an hour.
I stop to make a cup of tea. I fill the mug with hot water, watch the teabag drift aimlessly, imagine being cwtched on all sides, warm and safe as I float dreamlessly onwards.
When I look up, an entire afternoon has flung itself past my window.
Time is contracted and concertinaed and stretched beyond recognition, all at once.
From between the folds; the song of a blackbird emerges, unfurls. On and on it goes, until it fills the infinite void.
— Ruth Stringer (Cardiff, Wales)

April 4, 2020April 4, 2020

Tiny Coronavirus Stories: ‘Isolated for days on end’

In my most recent work, Wanderings, I include a broad range of photographic approaches, including digital capture and output, photo-encaustic on paper, and historical processes such as wet plate collodion. Wanderings began in 2015 as an investigation into place and family, and now amidst the COVID lockdown, I have found myself and my daughter isolated for days on end with nowhere to go but to walk on our six acres. In this space, new worlds have been created, ideas fostered, and photographic collaboration between mother and child has developed.
— Brooke C. White (Oxford, Mississippi)

April 3, 2020April 4, 2020

Tiny Coronavirus Stories: ‘Cada dia, noche, y año’

March 23.
ACT UP New York posts an image referencing David Wojnarowicz.
The Twitter queers and allies tear it up.
“Why Mar-a-Lago? … this ain’t it.”
“DO NOT COMPARE THESE TWO.”
They forget that the poor and the colored bodies were most impacted by the HIV/VIH and AIDS/SIDA epidemic(s)…
They are suffering.
Cada dia, noche, y año.
No access to health care.
Upward mobility blinds—blinds the better off.
The comparison? The poor and colored bodies suffer(ed) the most.
So if I die because of a lack of resources, take me to Mar-a-Lago.
— Alined Bolero (Orange, California)

March 31, 2020April 3, 2020

Tiny Coronavirus Stories: ‘Community space is under renovation’

Sheltering in place, New York City. I bike, repeatedly, to visit my girlfriend; she bikes back. Biking is strange, even scary. Pedestrians are everywhere, together and separate, on the sidewalks and the bike path, each jockeying for aerosol-free private space. For several days I am pissed off at the bike path intruders; why don’t they walk or run where it’s safe… away from me and my pent-up bike? And then it hits me. Community space is under renovation. Let it go, I tell myself. Slow down. It’s a new world, maybe a kinder one? Do I have it in me?
— Michael Chase (New York, New York)

March 29, 2020April 3, 2020

Tiny Coronavirus Stories: ‘The subtle encroachment of a new age’

At the store, I replenish food supplies and check, again, for cleaning products. I’m struck by the boundaries that have been placed, the subtle encroachment of a new age, an air of sci-fi dystopia. Tall robots clean the aisles. “We’re stronger together,” a soft, feminine voice says over the loudspeaker. There are acrylic shields between guests and clerks, tape on the floor designating six feet between each patron like marks on the stage of a surreal, somber play. I pick up a jar absentmindedly, put it back, feel guilty; I never realized how frequently we touch each other.
— Alexis Bobrik (Berryville, Virginia)

March 28, 2020April 3, 2020

Tiny Coronavirus Stories: ‘To survive the storm’

The wind-driven snow has piled up all month into towering drifts with knife-edge crests. There is a white bird, a Rjúpa, a ptarmigan in winter dress. She nestles down in the lee of the drift just below the crest to ride out the storm. Against the snow her eye and beak make tiny black marks. She stays there for hours. She is patient, calm, enduring, safe, well-equipped by nature to survive the storm. I bring this memory forth, and I feel calmer, more able. Nature is generous with her gifts.
— Andrea Krupp (Pennsylvania)

March 27, 2020April 3, 2020

Tiny Coronavirus Stories: ‘This week, restiamo a casa’

We came to create an artist-residency program in the half-abandoned, mountain village of Fontecchio. Last month: Rome, no lines at the Vatican Museum, the Auditorium Parco della Musica, a dentist appointment. Three weeks ago: a winding drive for blues at a rural restaurant, to kiss both cheeks of everyone is good manners. The week after: a small dinner party where we sip rum, tap shoes, joke about The Decameron. Last week: to see friends or hike trails solo is a violation of the order. This week, restiamo a casa: he teaches me Tango, I remove wallpaper in long strips.
— Allison DeLauer (Fontecchio, L’Aquila, Abruzzo, Italia)

March 25, 2020April 3, 2020

Tiny Coronavirus Stories: ‘Searching for her courage’

I’m thankful my mother isn’t dealing with all this. I’m thankful she doesn’t have to live in fear of another disease infecting her compromised body, though I do wish I could hear her voice. She would respond to the current state of the world with words of courage and comfort. Neither dismissing my fears nor playing into them. She would repeat the words she always spoke to her students: “Face the future with warm courage and high hopes.” My days at home begin by looking out the window and searching for her courage.
— Lisa Kitchens (Brooklyn, New York)