One day during quarantine, I had a thought about my lack of knowledge of my mother's and father’s family histories past two or three generations beyond a name or profession. I found this shocking, considering that those pasts make me who I am today. This realization makes me feel like I am doing my ancestors a disservice by not attempting to learn more about them. There are many stories that I know bits of and want to know more about, but I am specifically interested in why many of us do not strive to know more about our own histories. We are preoccupied with everything happening in our lives, yet our ancestors have everything to do with our lives. I want to tell a story about ancestry with where I am at right now, what I can remember about my family, my knowledge, and what I do not know. I want to explore creating family trees and trying to depict memories or my feelings on the memories of my current familial knowledge. Learning about ancestry and documenting is a lifelong process, and I know that if I do not remember, my continuing blood line will not remember. This is challenging for my mother’s side of the family because I am my grandmothers’ only grandchild. Is it right to worry about remembering? Are people meant to be forgotten after a few generations? Are people only important while they exist, and then they just don’t matter anymore because there are too many other things to occupy our minds and do in the world, beyond a bloodline? I think about how much lineage mattered in past and in family trees, but today I have such a limited grasp. I wonder if other people share the same sentiments, or if all of our memories pass us by eventually.
Initial imagery and drawings made with Procreate and Photoshop based on genealogy, reflection, and roots
My ancestry print collection on a superimposed on a still from the film, "Picnic at Hanging Rock", 1975
Genealogy
Reflected Light
Roots
