Lois Keller
“Beauty is a manifestation of secret natural laws which, otherwise, would have been hidden from us forever.”
Goethe
Nature vs. Nurture is my reality. I’m an artist, born in 1968, adopted into a loving midwestern family in 1969. I am a secret to some, with non-identifying paperwork, yet it’s how I identify myself today. I’m both sides of a coin in a game of chance.
After leaving home I was never really sure where I fit in, so I tried to fit in everywhere to find my quiddity, or true “nature.” This is when art began to define just me. When I’m drawing or painting I am neither this or that, here or there, Irish or Yugoslavian, but present in my own reality. I have obsessively made pictures every day of my life. Existential questions can creep in and take over my mental health, instead art lets me express them. Perhaps to prove I’m really supposed to be here, or to send out messages in hopes of being found, I’m not always sure, but I do know that every mark is the world filtered through me seeking to uncover those secret laws of nature.
Today I have the sad luxury of hindsight because both my birth mother and father as well as my adopted Mom and Dad have died. Through their deaths, my love for how I got here has expanded beyond anything I can express in words. Luckily for me art has helped me do that too.
I want to express gratitude to my husband and daughters, adopted family and found family for loving me just as I am and to Jeff and all the adoption stories here for helping me not feel so alienated from the rest of the world. It’s so nice to get to know all of you.
