Some years back, shortly after the show Portlandia had targeted the intersection between art and commercialism with the meme Put a Bird on it!, some cultural journalist in Salon wrote about her acute discomfort when purchasing bird-related art and/or craft. She had become self-conscious in the wake of the joke, wondering if she – as so many of us – was the butt of it. She described the feeling with a newly invented German term – der Vogelschäme – which cracked me up since it captured the emotional reaction perfectly, but was all wrong linguistically. (It would be die Vogelscham – the bird shame.)

I am no longer easily laughing at it, since it has become clear to me that cultural trends and stereotypes exert demand characteristics that are hard to ignore. As an artist it is difficult to navigate a world where art that inflames, defies and disturbs is considered more important than art that expresses simple beauty or unfiltered portraits of nature. And I believe this is doubly true for women artists. Having said that, I can, of course, think of several women painters who are perfectly accepted into the canon of modern art while painting still lives or fairytale scenes. Or are they?

In any case, I have had to work on myself to allow serious time spent with bird and landscape montages, rather than my usual topics of social justice and displacement.  I consider that progress and will celebrate it with today’s picture of the sweetest, simplest, and  – yes – cutest bird I could find in my recent photographs.