This art piece had an interesting evolution, from thrift store frame to background "story"

Date:   10/26/2018 3:42:23 AM ( 6 y ago)

I bought the frame at my local thrift store. The frame came with a small art print inside; the print was of a bouquet of flowers on a faux letter.* I wanted to use the cardboard the print was glued on so I started to remove the print, and it tore. As soon as it did, I had the idea of keeping the print and repurposing it. The torn print looked like a "love letter" to me, and I imagined that it was an old-fashioned letter of farewell from a young woman to a young man. I imagined that the young man initially tore and crumpled the letter in his anguish, meaning to throw it away, but then changed his mind and kept it. When he was an old man, he'd take out the now-worn letter and re-read it, igniting memories of long ago.



Eco Art by mayah(c)2018 "Lost Love" 10" X 14"

Repurposed print and background cardboard with acrylic paint and hand embroidery; images of woman/head flowers from craft magazine embellished with seed beads; braided ribbon and lace scrap; handkerchief and frame from thrift store. To make the patterning on the background cardboard, I cut a raw potato in two and created a potato "stencil"; first learned to do this when I was an elementary school student.



Close-up of re-painted and hand-embroidered flowers.



close-up of young woman

As I worked on the art piece, the words that the "young woman" in the piece might have written in her "farewell letter" materialized in my head; I imagined the letter was written during a time and in a place where social class distinctions were rigid, and marriage between people of different classes was, if not illegal, strictly socially prohibited:

"Dear Charles,

I am writing to thank you for the beautiful pearl necklace that arrived, with much surprise, at my flower shop doorstep weeks ago in honor of my birthday. It is the most exquisite gift I have ever received, and while I dare not wear it out in public, I have placed it in a treasure box that is kept next to my bed, and I look upon it every night before I sleep so that I may dream of you. Perhaps one day my future daughter will receive it as a wedding gift.

I sincerely apologize for the delay in sending you this letter of thanks. In the months since we parted I have tried to write to you several times, but stayed my hand as my heart was too pained for words to flow freely.

Yet now I must inform you with tears in my eyes and a trembling heart, that I am newly betrothed to Benjamin and will marry him come Spring. He is a good man, and his father and mine have long been of acquaintance. Benjamin is a carpenter by trade, so I will never lack for a decent roof over my head. Please know that I would wish it otherwise, as my heart belongs to you now and forever.

Let us hope and pray that in our children's futures it will no longer be considered unseemly for a person of means to marry someone who labors for a living, so that men and women may marry as their hearts dictate them to do.

In farewell of you, my love, I have had a small portrait made for you to remember me by, posed with the flowers in my hair you so truly love, and the necklace you have given me 'round my throat. I have enclosed a small bouquet of dried flowers from my shop, a ribbon from my hair, a snippet of lace from the collar of the dress I wore when first we met, and a linen handkerchief embellished with my tears.

I am wishing for you, dear Charles, a long life of love and happiness. In sad yet loving farewell,

Sophie"



Framed piece

"Eco Art by mayah" utilizes re-used and earth-friendlier materials whenever possible


*original art by Carolyn Shores Wright


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