# 7 7 W Gi – M La Q S
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
I’ve always thought this pin was my brother’s, a Scout pin for something, some badge of honor, and even without knowing what it was I’ve felt the need to keep it safe and protected. I’ve found out from my mother that it belonged to my great grandfather. This makes it more precious and even more amazing that I never threw it out when fighting with my brother. Can our objects hold memories, and protect those memories?
# 8 4 E P – G La Q S *
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
I went to a garage sale in my grandparent’s neighborhood when I was 8 by myself. I came home with this glass cube, high-heeled shoes, a crystal scotch decanter, and a story about why the woman having the sale was selling her brand new wedding dress. I remember how hard it was riding my bike in those heels, and how sad the woman’s story was.
# 9 6 C Gi + Me Ca Q V *
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
This was from my paternal grandmother’s house. It comes completely apart and the sides of the box can be worn as a bracelet. It had red raspberry shaped plastic beads in it when I got it – I took them out when I received it because they made too much noise, but kept the beads elsewhere. I’ve since placed something else in it that rattles – the sound and the objects are tied together for me.
# 8 0 W G + W G A V
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
My mother kept treasures in here – a button, a marble and a bluebird pin. We weren’t allowed to open it or play it or wind it, and unfortunately there was no sneaking – when you opened the lid the music played and alerted grown ups that you were digging. We gradually figured out how to catch the latch and keep the music box motor from spinning so we could keep it quiet and look inside.
# 6 7 W P + W M Q V *
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
There’s a very elaborate way to get into this box. My mom said when she bought it in 1967 that she imagined hiding her best things in here, but that they didn’t always fit. I felt the exact same way about it – the secrets were great, but the hidden compartments were tiny. Of all the digging she tells me she did in my room, she tells me she never went into the box. I’ll give it to my daughter.
# 6 7 W P + Wm M Q V
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
This always lived under a bed, and was full of the most mysterious things. The box was very heavy, and the latch was very stiff, and you could pinch your fingers if a grown up wasn’t around to help you. The metal latches click when you move it, and inside it is covered in red fabric. I thought it was our pirate treasure. Turns out, my mother bought it in Mexico for $2.50 and put the red felt in herself.
# 5 7 W G + M La A S
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
The ideas I had about my mom based on this charm bracelet were wild – it had a ladder, an ashtray, a love meter, a wine glass and a wheelbarrow – to name a few. She has no recollection of it at all, and thought that it was bought for me. When I asked her who would buy an ashtray charm for a child’s bracelet, she realized that it must have been hers, but still had no memory of it.
# 5 7 W G + M La A S
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
My mom’s parents bought this for her in New Orleans when she was 8. I used to wear it when I was little too, and would rattle my wrist so the charms jingled. It never stopped making noise and has remained beautiful even with the extra tarnish – much like the city.
# 8 1 E G + S La A S
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
In first grade Lee Leblanc brought this to school. We stood in the square and he said whichever girl won the race to it could have it, and also be his girlfriend. I have no idea either how I won the race or why I still have this bracelet. I am fascinated though by the occurrence of ritual competitions for affection even at that young age.
# 8 2 W P – W La Q S
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
My mother does not know where or when she got this. She does know that she loved both butterflies and refrigerator magnets so this is perfect for her. I’ve seen this butterfly on every refrigerator in every house I’ve ever lived, even to this day.
# 8 2 E G + G La Q V *
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
My brother found this perfume in the parking lot at school and gave it to me. I loved it because the bottle was so pretty and tiny. As children in the 80’s we feared everything was poisoned, and only there to hurt us. I’ve kept the bottle, but still never worn the perfume.
# 7 7 W P – P La Q S
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
These hung in my childhood living room, and then in the bathroom. They were so very 70’s. I took them from a discard pile in the 80’s and stashed them for my own future home. I added the black details to make them look like wood block prints. They hang in our kitchen now.
# 7 7 E G + P Ca A S *
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
I have had this little dog since I was 2, and he still hops. I remember seeking out vast flat surfaces for him to hop across – the dining room table and the kitchen floor were good spots for him to run. My mom says I always loved wind up toys, and that it was probably bought at a K&B drugstore to keep me quiet in a long line. I always loved impulse purchases.
# 7 8 W G – W Tx Q S
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
Of all the things in my parents’ home, these were a favorite. They were wooden, and unbreakable and still could not be used as toys. My mom didn’t like them when her parents gave them to her, but she says, “I knew they would notice if I didn’t have them sitting around and it would have hurt their feelings.” These figures sat on a living room shelf for decades before I left with them.
# 7 8 W G – S A Q S
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
The jade elephant has always been a precious thing in the jewelry box, though I have no recollection of him ever being worn by either my mother or myself. I remember looking in my mom’s jewelry box when I was small, and how, from under the pearls and cloisonné beads and earrings the green jade would shine.
# 8 0 E G – C T Q S
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
I remember that I had the lady first, then the little girl came and I thought they could be a mother and daughter, even though the little girl was stylistically different. I find myself now holding the lady’s little hands and absent mindedly stroking them between my thumbs and forefingers – my body remembers these objects before I do. The little girl’s head, like the rabbit’s ear, shows signs of reattachment.
# 7 9 W G + M I Q S *
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
I thought the peacock was so exotic, and was a tarnished priceless treasure. It lived on my mom’s desk for 20 years, and after she brought it home I found that he is made so that his tail can be removed. It became even more mysterious to me, and I remember walking past the bookshelf he perched on and admiring him, and wondering where he came from, who made him and why his tail came off.
# 7 9 E G – C La Q S
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
Someone gave this to me when I was 3. I broke his ears off constantly, not out of spite, but curiosity. Each time I would deliver him to my mother for her to glue them back on. At this point, one ear has been lost, and she told me she wished she had it to glue back on for me.
# 9 7 C Gi - G Va Q V
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
I got this from my paternal grandmother’s house after she passed away. I never really knew her, or any of my dad’s family, so when I was offered a possession to remember her by I chose this. I had a similar shoe from my maternal grandparents and was excited to have set, albeit a mismatched set. This Fenton art glass will sell on eBay for $6, but the value to me is in having some artifact from my father’s family.
# 9 5 W Gi – C G Q V
2007, digital inkjet print, 11" x 14"
This ceramic figurine has a “Made in Germany” stamp on the bottom, so I know it came from my maternal grandmother who went to Europe every year. I found it at the house after she died, and thought there was something interesting about it. I never had an emotional attachment to it, and don’t know much about it, but that the chipped flower on the front makes me really sad.
Object Portraiture
Object Portraiture is a series of images created in an effort to investigate how my personal identity has been shaped, or unraveled, by the knick-knacks that I was surrounded by in my parents’ home. This series explores the role our memories of childhood play in our adult lives and how our surroundings are as much a part of our history as the people and events that inhabit them.
I was raised in a home where there were things for my brother and I to play with and things that we were not to touch. The valuable, the breakable and the sentimental objects belonged to adults. Specifically in my relationship with my mother, there was a perceptible and defined line between what was mine and what was hers. Music boxes were enjoyed with adult supervision, dainty figurines were not to be played with as dolls, and pieces that hung on walls were tantalizingly out of reach making them mysterious and powerful. The need to touch things is a natural part of every child’s development and the urge in me to lay hands on things was particularly commanding. However, as I began packing to move away from my parents’ house an interesting thing happened. My mother began giving me things, most notably, the things that had been my favorites. These objects, that my child’s hands had reached for countless times over the years, and from which I always recoiled when told to not touch, were being given to me. Wrapped up and nestled into boxes, they became mine and, eventually, my husband’s. As I look around our home I am surprised by how much of my childhood is here, and how, though I am a continent away from my mother’s house, there are objects here that make me feel as though I never left. I began to wonder how these things had come to me, and my mother before me. I feel that as I answer these questions I will understand more about why they have lasted so long in all of our homes.
Many of these images were created by using the scanner as the camera. I specifically see the scanner as a natural evolution from the pinhole cameras I have made and worked with in the past. The act of creating a camera out of something that is not a camera is a powerful and magical experience. Leaving the lid up on the scanner allows a bright white background to wrap around each object lying on the glass. This softens the edges, and obscures the clear outline of the glass, wood and porcelain pieces that I am studying. Like the act of memory, this allows only fragments of the whole to be clearly seen. I have created a cataloging system as well for the pieces, and though none of them are priceless to anyone but me, the notations ensure that their stories will not be lost again.
To get these stories, I interviewed my mother many times, had her write about the objects and complete worksheets that I created to help her remember and organize our process. We had many conversations to compare stories and questioned each other’s memories about the objects and how they had come into our lives. I also wanted to know why, after a lifetime of not being allowed to lay hands on these items, they were now being firmly pressed into mine as I was wished a good journey and good luck.
I feel as though, by sending these objects with me, there was obviously a piece of my parents’ home being sent with me. Were they talismans, sent by my Louisiana-bred mother, to protect me from the world I was entering, or were they strings tying me firmly to my history no matter where I went? A part of my history that could be packaged and carried away would seem to allow a part of my mother to be brought with me too. The authority of these pieces is not, then, the objects themselves, nor is it the monetary value that they may one day possess. The power of these pieces and the images that I have made of them lies in the stories that surround them, and specifically, how the collecting and telling of those stories blur the line that was once so clearly drawn between two women.