My Dearest Herbert

I've come to the conclusion that we can know a person best by what they leave behind. The objects they have accumulated and what they have chosen to surround themselves with tell stories about their likes, dislikes, personality, obsessions and even dreams. When I stumbled across the intimate letters written by Irmgard Watson to Herbert Watkins, it was apparent that the greatest part of their lives together was contained within those pages. The letters date from the 1920's through the 1950's and catalogue their estrangement due to Herbert's work, as well as document their courtship, marriage and life afterwards.

In My Dearest Herbert I've highlighted aspects of their lives with the materials used within the piece. White ribbons symbolizing her wedding dress are suspended from a bright white fluorescent light, which references his job at the Westinghouse small lamps division. She speaks of a shirt he left behind during once of his visits and how she darned it for him and sewed a missing button on. Thus, the use of antique buttons to hold the letters and ephemera to the ribbons.

I wanted to create a suspended moment in time, where it flirted and rested lightly on the ground, warm in color and soft, inviting the viewer to come up and read a page or two. I also desired tension to exist within the piece, the feeling of being under investigation or observance, slightly removed from the light source. I feel Irmgard and Herbert yearned for eachother and even 10 years after they were married they were separated due to his work. This is why no letters or correspondance actually reach the light source.

Through this piece I've struggled with the rightness of displaying something so personal for all the world to see. I searched for the two of them and their family, but made no headway. It seemed like a beautiful homage to two ordinary, yet personally extraordinary lives. However, some may not feel this way. Regardless, it is their moment, captured, reclaimed and retold for all to either choose to partake in or not.

My Dearest Herbert (detail)

Ava Larkin

10' x 4' x 1.5'

Paper ephemera, ribbons, buttons, light