Memento Mori
Some Chinese Horses
My mother had a collection of Chinese bisque horses many of which I had given her. I would find them in antique shops and flea markets to give her for her birthdays. Sometimes other animals made it into her collection — a blue dog, a green monkey. They were all quite small. She arranged them in little groups on her book shelves.
After my mother died the animals came to me. When a parent dies a lot of their things need a home. Some are useful, some wanted, some not. I liked my mother’s little Chinese animals but didn’t have a place to put them. So I photographed them and made a book of the photographs. I’ve kept the book and given the animals to my son who always liked them.
Some Chinese Horses
Ada’s Animals
Before I packed up the little animals to send my son I made some drawings of them. I wasn’t sure why I had the impulse to draw them and I didn’t think the drawings were very nice so I threw out most of them. Eventually I made a small book of the better ones. The drawings are of my hands holding the tiny figures.
I realize now that the photographs are about the animals but maybe the drawings are about my hands holding memories of my mother.
Some Pipes
My father collected a lot of things. An excess of things. Foremost were books. He also collected and smoked pipes. He had fewer pipes than books, only about 3 or four packing boxes full of pipes and pipe smoking paraphernalia.
No one at my house smokes a pipe. It’s not that easy to find where to give or sell or dispose of boxes full of pipes. So I took handfuls of the nicest looking ones and laid them on a stainless counter and photographed them and made a book. The pipes are back in their boxes in a storage room still awaiting a home.
Some Pipes
Some Pipes
Some Chinese Horses made in an edition of 3. 6 x 8 inches. Five archival ink jet prints mounted on stonehenge paper, bound with stonehenge paper jacket. 2012.
Ada’s Animals is a unique book. 5.25 x 7.25 inches. Six drawings with brush and sumi ink, gouache and white gouache on arches paper. 2009.
Some Pipes made in an edition of 3. 6 x 8 inches. Fourteen archival ink jet prints mounted on stonehenge paper, bound with stonehenge paper jacket. 2012.