Between Two Worlds - 2025

Materials: Vintage photos and postcard, fabric, watercolor

Size: 9" x 12"

My favorite family photo-three women, my immigrant grandmother and aunt, then my 1st gen mother. Looking so happy together one wouldn't realize the troubles they endured. Photos are deceptive and it was a challenge to make their way in their beloved adopted country trying to navigate against and around the misogyny and bigotry they encountered, with no reliable husband or father to help. Whatever the struggles they stuck together as a team to overcome them, three strong women working together to assure a good life in the US. Just like so many immigrants are trying to do today.

My grandmother died when I was quite young though I remember sitting on her lap, talking with her and looking into her very blue eyes. Funny, because I later found out she hadn’t been able to speak English. Because their household would have been a combination of Yiddish and English I chose to use as a background a page of The Forward, a newspaper which reported in both. The advertising promoting the American way of life was particularly interesting to me. Most notable was the irony of the matrimony service ad contrasted with the handwritten text at the bottom relating my grandmother’s unsuccessful attempt to legally force my grandfather to support his family. Which was met with a scolding by the judge.

The postcard represents their voyage inside of America, focused mainly on the east coast in the tri-state area.