Pam’s Pictorama Post: Vacation dawned here in NJ yesterday. Kim and I are officially “off” although I have to report to work one day this week and perhaps another the week after, nonetheless we are kicking up our heels a bit. Pictorama readers who have been following in real time know that although we had some trouble settling in, we have already started to adopt a vacation frame of mind. (Prior posts include ones here, here and here.)

So today, a quick little post devoted to one of a few bits of family art that survived the moves my parents did in the later years of their life. Having gone from a house chock full of art to much smaller digs, sadly not all the art made the moves. (I am most sad about a bronze sculpture of a horse running with a dog along side which my mom gave away.)

The painting I am posting about today was recently pulled out of a closet and hung over our bed. My mom said it was by Carolyn Wyeth (1909-1994), sister to Andrew and daughter of N.C., which is likely because my dad filmed a documentary on her many decades ago. Dad did most of the art buying and he would have found the opportunity like catnip and he held the opinion that she should have been better known.

I can’t find a signature on it but frankly not willing to take it off the wall to see if there’s one on the back. It could probably use at least a light cleaning and perhaps that would reveal a signature on the front. However, stylistically it seems right, especially the trees.

Anyway, I write about it because I have been very enamored of it since it arrived in the house when I was a small child. Although the wintery scene is not the most cheerful, it occupied my imagination for hours on end. I cannot remember what stories I made up about it in my mind, but as soon as I took it out the memory of making up such stories came racing back to me.

The lack of definition in the figures, bundled up against the snow and the cold, bothered me a bit. I guess I had my critical chops as a small child. But the not quite entirely monochromatic nature of it interested me even then. The tiniest bit of red on the figure on the porch was of great interest to me, long before I would have been able to explain why. The texture of the paint is satisfying, even without being thick.

It gave me satisfaction to have it back up and I find myself getting lost in it again, which after all, is what paintings are for.