Daisy Project
BACKGROUND: A flower historically associated with new beginnings, loss, and healing: the daisy represents my experience as a product of the closed domestic adoption industry in the United States. The daisy represents the tragic loss of my mother and sister 12 years before my reunion with family. The daisy also represents new beginnings: from finally having access to my family after 30 years of legal restriction, to learning about my personal historicity, and having the ability to connect with the remaining family I was so lucky to find.
The daisy – much like my adopted identity – is also representative of possibility. Kimberley Leighton, a philosopher and authority on adoption offers an explanation in her first-person account of dealing with identity as an adoptee. Leighton goes on to explain that “being adopted has been an identity of possibility; it has been a way to make sense of the tensions produced by being both at once a product of one’s own environment, and someone whose meaning always exceeds that environment. It has been a way to understand family as both a place from which one always comes and a place from which one is always looking.”
PROJECT GOALS: To raise funds and awareness to (1) help people who are/were adopted or in foster care who have a need to access and understand their biology; (2) help support organizations that are committed to family preservation, search, and reunion, and; (3) help advocate for a person's right to their original identity and open access to their biological families.
The daisy – much like my adopted identity – is also representative of possibility. Kimberley Leighton, a philosopher and authority on adoption offers an explanation in her first-person account of dealing with identity as an adoptee. Leighton goes on to explain that “being adopted has been an identity of possibility; it has been a way to make sense of the tensions produced by being both at once a product of one’s own environment, and someone whose meaning always exceeds that environment. It has been a way to understand family as both a place from which one always comes and a place from which one is always looking.”
PROJECT GOALS: To raise funds and awareness to (1) help people who are/were adopted or in foster care who have a need to access and understand their biology; (2) help support organizations that are committed to family preservation, search, and reunion, and; (3) help advocate for a person's right to their original identity and open access to their biological families.
2021-2022 Partnership Catherine McAuley Center
SCRANTON, PA: The mission of the Catherine McAuley Center is to provide temporary shelter for women, children and individuals in crisis and, through custom case management, empower them to maintain safe and affordable permanent housing.
Biological family preservation in times of crisis is at the heart of this organization’s work. The Center helps families they work with stay together where in many cases - if not for intervention - children would have to endure family separation; being placed in foster care, or the adoption system.
Over the past several decades, the Center has expanded to meet the needs of an evolving population of women and children experiencing homelessness, extending its services to include scattered-site rapid rehousing and transitional housing for women and children, women who have been incarcerated; and chronically homeless adults and families with mental health and other disabilities.
Beyond the shelter of a roof and walls, the Catherine McAuley Center’s wide range of supportive services helps individuals and families overcome the trauma of homelessness through a client-centered approach that includes education, counseling, life skills, education, and access to employment and training opportunities. All services are provided free of charge.
Partial proceeds from the sale of each daisy will be donated to the Catherine McAuley Center to help offset the costs of programs and services that support biological family preservation in times of crisis.
Material: Pressed Paper Size: 3 inch diameter Color: White Climate: Indoor
Cost: $ 5 USD
How to Purchase: AFA Gallery, Scranton PA July 1-31, 2021, more information to follow.
Biological family preservation in times of crisis is at the heart of this organization’s work. The Center helps families they work with stay together where in many cases - if not for intervention - children would have to endure family separation; being placed in foster care, or the adoption system.
Over the past several decades, the Center has expanded to meet the needs of an evolving population of women and children experiencing homelessness, extending its services to include scattered-site rapid rehousing and transitional housing for women and children, women who have been incarcerated; and chronically homeless adults and families with mental health and other disabilities.
Beyond the shelter of a roof and walls, the Catherine McAuley Center’s wide range of supportive services helps individuals and families overcome the trauma of homelessness through a client-centered approach that includes education, counseling, life skills, education, and access to employment and training opportunities. All services are provided free of charge.
Partial proceeds from the sale of each daisy will be donated to the Catherine McAuley Center to help offset the costs of programs and services that support biological family preservation in times of crisis.
Material: Pressed Paper Size: 3 inch diameter Color: White Climate: Indoor
Cost: $ 5 USD
How to Purchase: AFA Gallery, Scranton PA July 1-31, 2021, more information to follow.