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| Reunion oil/canvas 40 x 30 x .5 |
are abundant this hot time of year. Every year. Every other. Every five. My friend's annual reunion is called the "Am Slam Jam" stemming from the Ammerman family name. Our own, which is less frequent, has become "Hutch Fest". A few months ago, I found some older family photos...the one that inspired this painting. All of the people in this photo have passed, but the similarities in their facial structures and their personalities urged me onwards. I have been searching for so long so find a way to create a universal human experience without pinpointing a particular face, a particular place in time. Without, I might add, the homogenization that sometimes makes a work just too generic....like the sweet little girls or the angel faces that become the greeting card generic. I found such similarities between this reunion of yesteryear and the photos that we have taken at our own festivities...the alpha male, the retiring and overdressed female, those who "jump right in", and those on the fringes. Different photo. Same scenario. Everyone has an Uncle Henry.
For this group gesture, my goal was to reduce the importance of each face, while, enhancing the importance of the group gesture....its flow, its animation , its negative spaces.
Roller Coasters are no longer constructed of wood. High "divies" have been removed due to liability. But there is always an Uncle Henry.
