Wendy MacNaughton contributed three original works of art to the Rumpus to run alongside Jeannie Vanasco’s personal essay “The Glass Eye.”

I asked Wendy how she approached her work for this piece. She said, “I read it maybe four times, and made my girlfriend read it once. We picked it apart completely, and then I put it aside for a couple weeks. Then I read it again and thought about the subject’s relationship with her father, her shrink, herself, and memory—and eyes, a lot about eyes. And also the genetics of eye color, the neurobiology of sight, and a book by Margaret Livingstone called Vision and Art. I thought about how everything we see we see inside our brain, not outside like we think we do. Then I drew a woman from behind (who she will never see), a collection of glass eyes removed from their sockets, and an empty chair. And then I painted them.” See Wendy’s work here.

Tweet

Related Posts

• Coffee Forever
• “Less Judging, More Hugging”
• 48 Hours of Magazine-Making, Illustrated
• Writers and their Snack Choices
• Meanwhile, Outtakes