Dear President Obama is an unironic representation of the depth of my sorrow when he departed the White House and an open invitation for others to share in the mourning. I crowd-sourced the specific attributes we collectively missed about Obama as president, such as integrity, honesty, his family, and how his biggest scandal was that time he wore a tan suit. I then typed each response (on an old-fashioned typewriter); scanned and digitally manipulated the text; had custom fabric printed with the text images; and created a pile of soft sculptures (which most people refer to as pillows, which is fine) stuffed with recycled fabric. I envisioned constructing a large upholstered box filled with the sculptures that people could wallow in, like an adult-sized ball pit of sorrow, but the one-and-only public appearance of this work-in-progress was early March, 2020, just before the world closed down. Although I will never not miss President Obama, this work essentially expired with the end of the Trump presidency, so I began giving away its elements the day Biden was inaugurated.
Jeana Eve Klein 