Ketchikan’s Main Street just got a new resident. Well, the Main Street Gallery at least. Through the month of November, the photography and poetry of local artist Elizabeth Franklin is on display in the gallery.
The exhibit is called “Can You See Me.” According to the Ketchikan Arts Council’s website, Elizabeth Franklin’s work is about sharing strength and resilience inspired by Mother Earth.
Franklin said the inspiration for “Can You See Me” came from a friend of hers. “I was having a rocky time, and I was I was talking with my friend and she’s native. We were talking and I told I just feel like I speak different languages with several people. She said she feels the same way. She’s some Ketchikan and works in the hospital. She said that sometimes people get overwhelmed, and they cannot see me, they cannot see my soul, they cannot see my spirit. When she said, my mind just popped up like a poem. You know: can you see me? I think that sometimes, we get a little bit overwhelmed with the real world. And we all forget sometimes that we’re about our own soul, our own spirit, and we get busy with human work, you know.”
I caught Franklin on the phone as she ran around town preparing for opening night. She was very busy with human work.
Franklin is originally from Mexico City and moved to Ketchikan 20 years ago. She says she wanted to explore the world. She’s lived on the island ever since with her husband, a fisherman, who Franklin says is returning to port just in time for opening night. She says what she found here in Ketchikan, that’s what this exhibit is all about.
“These pictures and these poems are not just mine. They would not be possible without the help of an immense community, who works in nature who works to make us human beings in peace and allow us to find that beauty that we are surrounded by, so I really believe that this is a work for the town. I don’t really feel it’s mine,” she said.
