Paper Roses: Idea to Image

Inspired by memory, family and Miss Threadgoode of Fried Green Tomatoes...   My parents have packed up their house here in the city, in preparation for their move back to Ohio. the only thing not in boxes is their furniture.  The green chair that belonged in many houses before served as my visual inspiration. This summer I plan to complete a series of these 'portraits', pulling from old photographs of interiors and different chairs.  

Lately I've done a few artist workshops, talking about my where my ideas come from.  It has made me look back to my thesis work and consider why the color and content changed so drastically.  Like the modern and postmodern artists I admire, my work is loaded with personal symbolism (not always apparent without explanation) and a lot of that is a direct result of my own past experience.  One of my students asked me why I don't make work 'like my creepy ghost chairs' anymore, and my answer was simply that I am telling a different story now.  To quote from my earlier post  "This painting (one of a pair) is an exploration of memory, attachment and absence.  The subject matter is linked to my past work in graduate school, but the content has changed.  While my other pieces with furniture were about the process of forgetting, these paintings are about the preservation of a memory."

Paper Roses, acrylic on canvas, 24" x 36" 1 1/2"