JAYNE MATRICARDI: MOTHERSCAPE
Holding Absence
oil on wood, 4.5 x 10 feet, 2020-2021
Attachment and independence, oneness and separateness, self-estrangement and selflessness are simultaneously held by mothers in varying degrees. They form the basis for my multi-panel painting Holding Absence. It is both an image of any mother and daughter, and at the same time a particular portrait of an immigrant with her daughter: my great-grandmother and grandmother. Upon becoming a mother, I almost immediately and inexplicably felt an acute connection to the painful losses and separations of my ancestors. As I have portrayed them in this painting, bodies are shifted and dislocated across the panels, but closeness is still revealed in the bond between mother and child.