For the last 25 years or more I have had 2 drawings hung on my sitting room wall. When we decorate they might get moved about a bit, but they always go back up. They are so familiar I forget to regard them. I did them when I was about 17 years old. Pretty much copied from photos of my mother as a child. I’ll try to take some decent photos of them to post here if I can.
All those years ago, when I was almost the same age as my son is now, when my mother was the same age that I am now, I took the only two photos of her as a child and painstakingly copied them from the 2”x3” prints to drawings about 6”x9”. I have no recollection of why. I have a vague memory of my foundation course tutor liking them, but can’t recall why.
All these years later, I am embroidering shadows onto clothes that have a similar vintage to those worn by Mum in the drawings. For the last two years I’ve been doing work about parents and children, and only now have noticed these drawings and considered they may have a significance.
Probably not, a “red herring” perhaps?
When discussing it in emails with another artist she said:
“In those drawings somewhere is the kernel of what you do and why. You just need to find it…
They appear to be about childhood memories; processed as a child, from a child’s perspective…
They are also vintage, retro, nostalgic, safe in that they are at one remove from today. They have happened….”
Someone else said (it was Bo, he’s complaining I didn’t credit him)(excellent use of the pun, thank you): “it’s just a stitch in time”
Am I looking back or forward? As a parent or child? Some of my work seems to do both. I need to think about whether this is ok, or if I need a clearer standpoint.
I can’t believe I haven’t seen these drawings before now. Turns out I’m really UNobservant.
I’ve got no one to blame but myself, I’ve made my own brain hurt.
