beth welch: the memory between us

FIRST WEDNESDAY opening: jul 6, from 6 - 9pm

ARTICULATE ARTIST TALK: SUNDAY, jul 10, AT 4PM.

normal gallery hours: TUe - SUn, 12PM - 6PM

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How well do you remember your grandmother? Your Great Grandmother? It’s likely that your memories of the generations of women that shaped your early life are somewhat blurry. Less crisp than that of your mother, which is hazier still than your memories of yourself. The very idea of memory is at the heart of the artwork of Beth Welch. She uses a few specific drawing techniques to illustrate the relationships that children have with those that raise them and, conversely, the relationship a parent has with their child. The focus of her work is less on the particular family dynamic, but on the remembered moments shared between them. How do those memories change as we grow older? How do we bring our current selves into the memories of who we, and our parents, were when we were children?

“Memory is neither static nor absolute. The mind recalls memories imperfectly, adding and releasing details, never able to recall the elusive truth of personal history. Childhood memories are bound in this reality of remembered facts and forgotten particulars, true fictions unto themselves.
No one teaches women how to be mothers. It is a skill learned through memory and emulation. A woman follows the teachings of the women who raised her, but only her own recollection of the lessons. Her memory is unerringly altered in the retelling of time. The maternal figures who so influenced her own course to motherhood are now only ghosts, hazy, their voices faint.” - Welch

One can easily feel the weight of the moments captured when reading the titles of the drawings. Welch creates a dialog and narrative that pulls the viewer into the setting of the airy compositions. She skillfully draws out the empathy of her viewer by posing each title as a question. Questions that we can see ourselves asking our parents. The drawings leave a generous proportion of breathing room around their subjects which acts to pull focus into the moment of touch between mother and child. The fact that these subjects are at the same time touching, and separated is a powerful visual metaphor for time, and often loss.

Learn more about Beth Welch .

This exhibition is presented alongside the latest works from Amy James, Linda Jeffers, & Craig McCullen. All works from these artists are on view, free of charge, during normal gallery hours (12 - 6 p.m., Tue - Sun) from July 5 - 24, 2022.