Daisy Patton
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daisypatton.bsky.social
Daisy Patton
@daisypatton.bsky.social
1K followers 490 following 340 posts
Exploring memory and living archives, the (disabled) body, story-carrying, and social/reproductive histories.
📍Western MA
She/her

https://linktr.ee/daisy_patton
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daisypatton.bsky.social
I loved this piece too 🤩 I wish I had gotten to spend more time at the show, there were so many incredible details to absorb!
A mixed media painting with a red background with text that says Abolish Patriarchy Abolish Capitalism Abolish White Supremacy Abolish ICE Abolish Settler Colonialism Abolish Monarchies Abolish Religions Abolish Caste Abolish Xenophobia and more with a painted blue female figure holding a drill with flowers coming out of it and a pencil in her other hand with many faces
October 30, 2025 at 6:27 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
I donated this afternoon before seeing this, fantastic!
Screenshot of an email donation to the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts for $100
October 24, 2025 at 3:27 AM
daisypatton.bsky.social
It's often belittled as weak, unnecessary, irritating. Those reactions are dehumanizing—we grieve because we love. And most importantly, in grief, we act.

"Untitled (Who is not better than him?)"*trans from Arabic, 91"x74"x3", oil on archival print canvas w/fabric, embroidery, tassels, flowers
4/4
A last detail showing more of the black velvet framing the painting, as well as the drooping portion of the fabric that has white tassels at the end. "Untitled (Who is not better than him?)"* translated from Arabic, 91"x74"x3", oil on archival print mounted to canvas with fabric, embroidery, tassels, fabric flowers with buttons, photo sourced from Cairo, Egypt
October 3, 2025 at 8:15 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
So many are under attack right now, but that doesn’t mean they should be abandoned. We are part of a greater whole, and we all deserve protection.

Grief is a form of carrying, protecting, loving, preserving. Mourning allows us to express our emotions, recognizing our humanity and others.

3/
Detail of the painting showing the body of the woman on the left, as well as a closer view of the objects on the table (gun, medals), as well as the fabric flowers on the velvet that frames the painting. "Untitled (Who is not better than him?)"* translated from Arabic, 91"x74"x3", oil on archival print mounted to canvas with fabric, embroidery, tassels, fabric flowers with buttons, photo sourced from Cairo, Egypt
October 3, 2025 at 8:15 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
My work is about devotion and care—that each life is worthy of joy, beauty, love. Phrases like “the vulnerable will fall by the wayside” or comments about how some are a small percentage of our population are horrific to me—when we are asked to see someone as disposable, we must resist.

2/
Detail showing the woman on the right, and the floral pattern emerging from the man that moves through the painting in a heart shape. The flowers themselves are heart-shaped. The woman is washed in a purple magenta, her outfit pink mourning dress. "Untitled (Who is not better than him?)"* translated from Arabic, 91"x74"x3", oil on archival print mounted to canvas with fabric, embroidery, tassels, fabric flowers with buttons, photo sourced from Cairo, Egypt
October 3, 2025 at 8:15 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
In moments like these, we are asked to treat others as expendable, ready sacrifices that will supposedly protect against additional harm. That has never, historically, been the case—they will continue to devour, over and over, until there is either no one left or they are stopped.

1/
A lifesize painting over photo on canvas of two women on either side of a large framed photograph of a man. The man is washed in hot pink, and the two women look up to him, wearing mourning clothes. The background is painted silver, and the framed photo rests on a table with a turquoise tablecloth that holds small boxes containing medals, as well as a gun. The painting is framed with black velvet with floral patterning, and white flowers are stitched under the curve at the bottom of the painting. White tassels are attached at the bottom points on the right and left. "Untitled (Who is not better than him?)"* translated from Arabic, 91"x74"x3", oil on archival print mounted to canvas with fabric, embroidery, tassels, fabric flowers with buttons, photo sourced from Cairo, Egypt
October 3, 2025 at 8:15 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
I've said this before—we live in the world COVID built. Accepting "the vulnerable will fall by the wayside" let the wealthy learn they could sacrifice many easily.

Even in this surge, ppl won't mask to practice care. Trump started this, but Biden solidified and was a stopgap for entrenched fascism
By now, the COVID-19 pandemic should have shown us that we’re supposed to rise to the occasion by meeting needs, not fall in line behind fascist incursions. The same forces that encouraged us to sacrifice the disabled, poor, and unhoused to a distorted idea of “natural selection” now instruct us to ignore the genocide of Palestinians. The same forces that pushed conspiratorial misinformation about public health and vaccination want us to give up on practicing collectivity. It’s connected because if we cannot be relentless in our determination to interrupt what’s unfolding before us, then we risk it becoming a disturbing norm.
September 18, 2025 at 6:57 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
The disposability of humans across everything—eugenics, AI, government, etc.—is breathtaking in its scope. Our survival depends on breaking these systems of inhumanity
There's a part of me that will never forgive the tech industry for what they've taken from me and what they've chosen to do with it. In the early days as the dawning horror set in, I cried about this almost every day. I wondered if I should quit making art. I contemplated suicide. I did nothing to these people, but every day I have to see them gleefully cheer online about the anticipated death of my chosen profession. I had no idea we artists were so hated—I still don't know why. What did my silly little cat drawings do to earn so much contempt? That part is probably one of the hardest consequences of AI to come to terms with. It didn't just try to take my job (or succeed in making my job worse) it exposed a whole lot of people who hate me and everything I am for reasons I can't fathom. They want to exploit me and see me eradicated at the same time.
September 17, 2025 at 6:51 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
It was a tough summer and now the start of a busy fall season, I'm excited to share this new headshot, as well as some upcoming shows in the coming posts—I'd be so delighted if you signed up for my newsletter, which you can find at the bottom of any page on my website ✨

www.daisypatton.com
A white femme looking person stands in front of a painting, wearing colorful puffball earrings, a dark green dress with paisley patterning, looking at the camera.
September 16, 2025 at 8:55 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
Here, houses are more than walls and roofs. They hold footsteps, smells, echoes of conversations. They keep the map of your life. When too many are gone, the city itself begins to forget. Streets lose their shapes, people lose their usual routes and routines, the landmarks that once oriented them—the corner shop, the mosque, the old tree at the end of the street. The mind’s map slowly disappears. And when a city forgets, the people lose more than shelter—they lose themselves, the proof of their existence and belonging.
September 8, 2025 at 8:46 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
33 cups of basil equals this much pesto 😅😋 This is a 9 cup Cuisinart so we'll be freezing the rest 🤩
A full to the brim cuisinart with pesto on a countertop
September 5, 2025 at 2:18 AM
daisypatton.bsky.social
I’m thrilled “Untitled (Three Women with Dandelion and Wild Rose Vines)” has joined the Ulrich Museum collection! I’m grateful to curator Jo Reinert and registrar Taryn Trapini. Public institutions esp academic settings are dear to me, & the source image is from Iran, so it is also a personal work
"Untitled (Three Women with Dandelion and Wild Rose Vines)," 44”x49.25”, oil on archival print mounted to panel with found mirror frame, 2024, photo from Iran sourced from New York City, NY A painted over photograph of three women posing together. One woman, with an orange wash over her face wearing green, is seated, while two women on either shoulder lean over her. The left woman wears a dark blue dress, her arm painted lavender with a dandelion patterning over it, and more emerge from her lavender hand resting on her friend. On the right is a woman washed in pink wearing a turquoise dress with a wild rose vine emerging from her hand. The background is a flat brick red, and the painting is framed in a periwinkle and white painted old mirror frame with patterning that is similar to ornate Persian miniature paintings. Detail of "Untitled (Three Women with Dandelion and Wild Rose Vines)," 44”x49.25”, oil on archival print mounted to panel with found mirror frame, 2024, photo from Iran sourced from New York City, NY This view shows a close up of the lower left corner, including the frame, as well as mode of the seated woman smiling. You can see painted metallic gold and silver crosshatching her clothing and pink dots on the blue dress of the standing woman. Side detail view of "Untitled (Three Women with Dandelion and Wild Rose Vines)," 44”x49.25”, oil on archival print mounted to panel with found mirror frame, 2024, photo from Iran sourced from New York City, NY This shows the upper right portion, including more details of the frame, as well as a closer view of the standing woman on the right.
August 29, 2025 at 8:56 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
Collective memory is shaped by the people carrying each story and history, as well as larger forces like institutions and governments. What we think about the past is not always as it was, but rather skewed through a different lens. I think a lot about what we choose to remember, who

1/2
Lifesize oil painting of a painted over photograph of two younger women, posing next to a green tree that is shaped in a V. One woman is seated in the center, and the other stands behind her wearing a hat. Both have a color wash over their faces and hands, blending from pink to orangey red. The grass is textured paint with pinks, magentas, and yellows, and a floral pattern emerges from the seated woman. Detail of the painting showing the pink ground and its texture, the frame which is a light creamy yellow and painted floral pattern in blues and white, and showing the seated woman's red shoes. Detail of the two women and their clothes—seated woman wears a plaid blue dress with a chartreuse undershirt, and the standing woman wears a mauve oversized shirt. The seated woman is leaning against the tree.
August 8, 2025 at 9:05 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
I'm working on a series-within-series from the Forgetting is so long work with photographs I am taking of people who have lost loved ones due to COVID. I am always seeking more volunteers to collaborate with, if you live in New Englandish area. More in the text below 💕

#art #painting #wip
Two paintings on canvas are on a wall. On the left is a woman holding her 3 year old child while holding a framed portrait of a woman. The colors are vibrant, with the figures washed in bright magenta and purples, as is the photo person. Floral patterns emerge from both Michelle the mother and her daughter. On the right is a painting of a man holding a framed photo of a man with text next to him that is a tribute. Behind the man is a bookcase with more photos. He is washed in purple, and his father in the photo is washed in a reddish violet. Floral pattern emerges from the man's hand and frames the painting. Part of the Forgetting series is a fundamental question: who do we remember and why? The work is meant to create a living archive of memory, a place where people can be cared for, carried forward in collective memory, and held close. There are so many causes for our current moment, with dehumanization playing a huge part. One area in which we have memory-holed and forgotten is the ongoing pandemic—I see writing declaring lockdowns as the most traumatic part, as if people weren’t dying and becoming incredibly ill, as if we actually truly locked down in the US. Many vulnerable people continue to medically mask, as it allows us to take part in public life. But mask bans proliferate, disabled people are continually seen as disposable and desirable to eliminate…and it is no surprise that we are repeating events from the 20th century of what came after the 1918 pandemic. I think often of the people who have lost loved ones and cannot grieve their deaths in the same way because of the politicization of the response to the virus, in the ways that other deaths in this country have fallen into this strange category. Despite that initial front page displaying 100,000 names at the beginning stages, we have no monument to the tremendous loss of millions…that is still happening. As part of my upcoming show on a specific type of mourning photography, that of posing with the photograph of a loved one no longer here, I am photographing people who have lost loved ones and collaborating together on their portrait for the first time in the Forgetting series. The first two are here, waiting to be framed out, and will on display this fall at UNC Charlotte Art Galleries as part of my solo “Breathing By the Wound.” I am incredibly grateful to work with the amazing and incredible Michelle Maroon and Jeff Elgart on these portraits and can’t wait to finish them soon ❤️
July 14, 2025 at 8:37 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
More below
I am going to say that again: the United States’ main export is ruins. We want to extract resources for our empire, whether that’s oil or minerals, we’ll destabilize whole swaths of the world to get our way. Look to Latin America and CIA interventions in supporting dictators who disappeared and murdered their citizens (a current aspiration of this current admin), look at SWANA. We do not bring freedom—we bring death. I do not say this lightly, but rather with the perspective of history and a desire for a better future that does not perpetuate such horrors. I want better for all of us. Few of us benefit from these colonial wars, with so much wealth is siphoned to the top and underclasses and the same less-than-human treatments to anyone not white and male. I don’t believe in begging for people to acknowledge someone’s humanity, because we are all, by the virtue of being alive, humans who deserve dignity, care, health and safety. I spent so much of my life hiding my father’s side because I couldn’t bear the heartbreak of constant dehumanization. Even now, the hawks within the US government are drooling about war, the few who aren’t still treat Iranians as subhuman, less deserving of their lives. Regime change and installing another authoritarian puppet is the plan—so much freedom, so much democracy I guess. It goes without saying I don’t support the current regime in Iran, but that isn’t our place to bomb them into “freedom.” One of my greatest fears was that the US would go to war with Iran and destroy so much of the country as it did with others. I see my Iranian friends all worry over their families and friends, while everyone else is quiet. Every life is a universe—I don’t support the killing of civilians regardless of where they are. But I do want to know, why so much hatred for a people that you don’t even bother to try to understand? How much heartbreak can we take?
June 20, 2025 at 8:40 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
Trying to make sense of the senseless. More in the text boxes below 👇
"Untitled (Five Color Fade Women with Bellflowers)," 48”x61.5”, oil on archival print mounted to panel with frame and found wooden salvage pediment, 2023, photo from Iran sourced in New York, NY A painted over photograph portrait of five women posing together, with two seated and the other three standing behind them, leaning on them. All women have color washes of pink and magenta, dressed in colorful and patterned clothes. An orange floral vine emerges from left and right that frame the piece, with the background being a strong vibrant blue. The painting is framed with a dark navy blue and has patterning painted on it, with a wood salvage pediment on top painted with navy, white, peach, and lime green. I’ve tried typing this so many times, and I don’t know how to describe the weight of grief that has been suffocating me these last weeks. Watching my birthplace and home in my heart Los Angeles be attacked with ethnic cleansing through kidnappings and threats, to seeing my father’s home being bombed with civilians targeted, with calls for destruction. I am almost 43, and my entire life has been one of vitriol towards Iranians. Never mind that Iranians just want peace and freedom and have fought for that for years, within Iran and in the diaspora. Never mind the US and British overthrowing a democratic government in 1953 because Iran took control of its own oil, never mind the US sending arms to Saddam during the Iran-Iraq war (and selling arms to Iran to fund the Contras in Nicaragua), never mind shooting down civilian flight Iran Air 655 during that conflict by a US Navy warship while in Iranian waters killing 290, never mind the last Trump admin assassinating a general and tearing up the nuclear agreement that gave *so much hope* that relations could normalize and maybe, just maybe, I could one day visit and others in the diaspora could return home….never mind our very recent history of watching the US create fake evidence to go to war with Iraq and the fallout from that, the US has to do it again because what else funds empire? After all, the United States’ main export is ruins.
June 20, 2025 at 8:40 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
Excited that Untitled (Color Fade Woman with Birdsfoot Violets) has joined the University Museum of Contemporary #Art at UMass Amherst collection! ✨

I’m so thrilled the UMass community will have access to this #painting in the years to come for study and work. 1/2
"Untitled (Color Fade Woman with Birdsfoot Violets)," 39.25"x22", photo sourced from Cairo, Egypt The painting is a life-size portrait of a woman cupping her face with her hands, washed in colors of lavender, pink and red. The painted over photograph shows the woman looking directly at the viewer with a soft, contemplative expression. From her hands that encircle over her head are a floral pattern of Birdsfoot violets. The background is dark navy with mauve dots, and the painting itself is framed in a found mirror frame painted chartreuse with white and blue details (including the same Birdsfoot violets pattern painted on the top of the frame).
June 6, 2025 at 8:43 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
I'm thrilled to share that "Untitled (Connie)," 46"x30", 2023, photo sourced from Grand Rapids, MI, is now part of the Mattatuck Museum in Waterbury, CT! I'm so grateful to Chief Curator Keffie Feldman for selecting this piece.

She'll be on display May 28 thru next year, so say hi if nearby 👋 #art
A portrait painting of a woman facing forwards and looking to her left/audience right. The painting is a painted over photograph—the photo underneath is from the 1930s-40s, probably an old photo booth image. Half of her face is washed with a vibrant reddish purple. Her outfit is aqua blue pinstripes with a yellow collar, and vines of reddish purple emerge from her head and encircle her with coral roses. The background is a pink wall with yellow framed window with a blue curtain. The painting is framed with a found antique mirror frame that has been painted a bright yellow green with a floral pattern of blue vines and yellow flowers.
May 16, 2025 at 9:40 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
Slowly wrapping up the last large works for my upcoming fall solo on mourning imagery.

I'm taking my own photos for the first time in the Forgetting series—of people who have lost loved ones from COVID. If you live in New England and want to participate, you can DM or email thru my website 💗 #art
View from my studio of two lifesize paintings in progress. On the left is a Victorian woman holding a photo of a baby, presumably hers that has passed away. The painting is on top of a photo, and the woman wears a dark burnt sienna dress, standing next to a purple and red curtained stand. Both the wood of the stand and the chair behind her is orange, and the floor is a patterned dark blue and purple, with the background being a dark peach. On the right is a woman standing behind an old and large radio, holding a photograph of presumably her son, who is wearing a sailor uniform. To the right is a dark hallway and a plant on the ground, and in the very front is a carpet. In front of both paintings is a painting bench and an air filter to the left.
May 13, 2025 at 9:16 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
Currently 🧑🏻‍🎨
Text in the images below ✨
#art #wip #painting
The artist, a short white person with dark brown hair, is wearing a olive green t shirt and dark blue shorts standing on top of a paint bucket while painting a lifesize painting. The painting is a photograph substrate of a funerary floral arrangement with the deceased couple's photograph in the center. Part one of text I’ve been working on a show about mourning and grief directly, instead of the usual subtle forms the Forgetting series can take. Grief is often a taboo emotion, and one often hidden or ignored. But you can’t hide grief—it spills out in ways we can’t always foresee, messy and complicated and misplaced anger. As we watch the destruction of so much of public services, wealth and knowledge, that grief is often focused on those who didn’t cause the suffering (marginalized peoples, the vulnerable, etc.) instead of those that have orchestrated this for years to seize more power and wealth from the rest of us. The grief of having chronic illnesses that were *so close* to cures now lost because of lost data, scientists, people who all were working towards so much good. Part two of text Not all is lost—it is worth fighting to protect each other from raids and secret police and harms, to uphold our values and understand the framework for what we are seeing now has been laid down decades and centuries before. Some of this is not new, some of this is far more vicious, and some of this echoes other shameful points in history. Hiding our heads in the sand will not fix this, but the good news is there are opportunities aplenty to work together to protect and keep what we hold dear. Grief is a marker of love, and it can also be a call to action.
May 6, 2025 at 8:10 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
So thrilled to receive my copy of In Memory: Remembering as a creative act, the catalog for In Memory at Utah MOCA curated by Laura Allred Hurtado. The book has images of the works, as well as essays on themes of the show. Excited to read this and grateful to have been curated into the show 💗
#art
A hand holds a black and white book whose cover says In Memory Remembering as a creative act, edited by Laura Allred Hurtado, Utah Museum of Contemporary Art. Behind the hand and book is a painting of a painted over portrait of a woman washed in lavender with little dots that look like stars all over her. She rests her head in her hands, and her elbows are propped onto a black and yellow pillow. The background is dark blue purple, and from her hands energy a floral pattern of coral vines and turquoise blue star flowers. A hand holds a black and white book that is opened to show on the left an image of one of my paintings, Untitled (Father and Two Daughters and Painted Backdrop with Campions), and on the right is 1. Embodied Memory, Work: Ana Mendieta, Julia Jacquette, and Daisy Patton. Then it says Text: Whispering Cave by Raquel Cecilia, Esculturas Rupestres by Kristina S. Gibby. Behind the hand and book is a painting of a painted over portrait of a woman washed in lavender with little dots that look like stars all over her. She rests her head in her hands, and her elbows are propped onto a black and yellow pillow. The background is dark blue purple, and from her hands energy a floral pattern of coral vines and turquoise blue star flowers. A hand holds a black and white book whose back cover has a quote from the book by Laura Allred Hurtado, essays by and the list of artists from the show. Behind the hand and book is a painting of a painted over portrait of a woman washed in lavender with little dots that look like stars all over her. She rests her head in her hands, and her elbows are propped onto a black and yellow pillow. The background is dark blue purple, and from her hands energy a floral pattern of coral vines and turquoise blue star flowers.
May 2, 2025 at 8:14 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
Current #wip in my studio 💕
Part of an upcoming show on mourning photos at UNC Charlotte

#art #painting
April 28, 2025 at 12:36 AM
daisypatton.bsky.social
I've been thinking a lot about eugenics and how it never left...more in the images and on my website:

www.daisypatton.com/put-me-back-...
Years of work went into “Put Me Back Like They Found Me,” a series on forced sterilization in the US and Puerto Rico. It’s a series that I think of often, and while eugenics never left this country, its stark rise during the still on-going pandemic—the declaration that only the strong should survive, that “the vulnerable will fall by the wayside” (Anthony Fauci)—that same twin hells of eugenics and fascism that happened post-1918 is very much present. As one of the vulnerable that is seen as disposable, it’s been incredibly hard though necessary to work on these series on reproductive justice, and just heartbreaking to see how easily our society has lost so many civil rights in the name of white supremacy and patriarchy. The past is not present indeed, and we have every opportunity to set things right and fight back against the dismantling of our collective rights and realize our fates are bound together, that harms against one are harms against all. From the statement: “Put Me Back Like They Found Me” centers the stories of cis female survivors of horrific, regular practices of forced sterilization in the United States. I embroider the portraits of survivors as a nod to domestic labor, “women’s work,” and thread as a metaphor for life. For living survivors, the work is a collaboration between the women and myself; each portrait is designed to contain a chosen element that has significance in their lives. Hospital gowns display painted text that focus on various survivors and the sufferings they have endured. It is truly impossible to understand the tremendous pain and violation forced upon so many people at the hands of governments, institutions, and doctors in the name of progress and white supremacy. There is a through line that connects eugenics to forced sterilization to loss of liberty and even genocide. "Melvina Hernández," Embroidery, 23" diameter, 2016, an embroidered portrait of a Mexican American woman wearing a white collared shirt with red and white checkerboard, and on either side of her are flowers from her garden. The portrait is framed with a black hoop A blue worn hospital gown with white text painted on that says: "I don't want it. I don't approve of it, sir. I don't want a sterilize operation...Let me go home, see if I get along all right. Have mercy on me and let me do that." —a woman pleading with the North Carolina eugenics board, 1945 36"x30", 2019
March 21, 2025 at 9:34 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
This #painting was from Before These Witnesses at Harold J. Miossi Gallery.

"Untitled (Wedding Couple in Car with Anjou Rose Vines)," 61”x61”, oil on archival print mounted to canvas with fabric, embroidery, fringe, floral buttons, and fabric flowers, photo sourced from Easthampton, MA 🌼
2/2 #art
Detail of "Untitled (Wedding Couple in Car with Anjou Rose Vines)," showing the top left of the painting and close up of the flowers stitched on, as well as the wedding couple with a closer view of their faces.
March 18, 2025 at 8:17 PM
daisypatton.bsky.social
In repression, tenderness and joy can exist—they are essential for surviving, to push for better futures, to emphasize how important each of our lives are. A photo is documentation, historical and personal, a declaration that we lived, we loved, and we were here—and can never be erased. 1/
#art
A lifesize painting of a painted over photograph of two white men inside a car. One is dressed in a bridal outfit (on the right), color washed in aqua with gold earrings. On the right the man is half washed in a magenta red, and both are smiling happily. The car is a reddish purple with a yellow ribbon attached, and coming from the bride is an Anjou rose floral pattern that circles downward. The painting is framed with fabric that is white with green and blue floral patterning and birds, and stitched on top and the top sides are many fabric flowers that are white, yellow, and coral. More flowers dangle from each side in a small bunching, and at the bottom, there is a line of flowers, mostly yellow with a few white, that dangle from the piece, almost like the traditional tied objects to the wedding car driving away. Detail of "Untitled (Wedding Couple in Car with Anjou Rose Vines)," showing the dangling flowers on the right side of the painting, as well as some of the "bride" in the painting.
March 18, 2025 at 8:17 PM