Yesterday I helped my mother do some sorting in her house, which included the discovery of a pile of books I had as a child. In poking through images I hadn't seen in 40 years, I realized how long and hard I had stared at so many of the pictures in these books! It was like I was intent on memorizing the colors, shapes and designs I saw there.
Case in point: here's an old fairy tale book of mine. My favorite story was "The Twelve Dancing Princesses," not so much because I liked that story but because I LOVED looking at the illustrations of the shoes that accompanied it. I even colored in the black and white drawings with crayon! I knew I wasn't supposed to write in my books, never mind color them in, but I couldn't help myself.
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| Page from "The Red Fairy Book" |
Coming across this page is striking, because it reminds me of the shoe drawings I've made in recent years:
And the black ribbon on the shoe drawing on the page in the fairy tale book ...
... reminds me of the black line paintings I've done this year.
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| "Scrawl 2," acrylic on canvas, 30 inches square, 2013 |
So it seems the visual inspirations experienced during childhood settle in our unconscious minds, and remain with us throughout our lives!
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