I loved this. There is something cosy/eerie, domestic/wild about a dollhouse. How extraordinary it must have been to be in the old family home but with the familiar furniture disappeared. Awful feeling of grief or disociation in the child 'you' looking for signs of her mother's presence. Amazing the things children are just expected to make sense of.
This one had me thinking "A Doll's House" (Ibsen) - some significance there for your mom? And - boy, do you resemble her in this photo! As usual, very moving observations, dear Eliza.
That painting is exquisite— the decorative pattern in the background and the foregrounded mini-house. Lovely and intimate and moving, especially in the context of a divorce.
I loved this. There is something cosy/eerie, domestic/wild about a dollhouse. How extraordinary it must have been to be in the old family home but with the familiar furniture disappeared. Awful feeling of grief or disociation in the child 'you' looking for signs of her mother's presence. Amazing the things children are just expected to make sense of.
Thank you, Lucy
Beautiful and poignant, Eliza. The dollhouse is such a potent symbol of family life. That it lives on in your mother's paintings is wonderful.
Thank you, Wendy.
Beautiful and poignant, Eliza. I agree with Wendy above and was going to say something similar x
Thank you, Lindsay
This one had me thinking "A Doll's House" (Ibsen) - some significance there for your mom? And - boy, do you resemble her in this photo! As usual, very moving observations, dear Eliza.
Thanks, Amy. I don’t think there was an Ibsen connection. She did have a lifelong thing for dolls and toys
Your slant on the doll house from your childhood that your mother painted splits the meaning wide open - the literal becomes literary.
Literal to literary, yes!
Lovely painting and writing!
Thank you, Cynthia
That painting is exquisite— the decorative pattern in the background and the foregrounded mini-house. Lovely and intimate and moving, especially in the context of a divorce.
And haunting, so haunting