Sculptures created by carolyn tillie
mixed emotions
Started during the beginning of the COVID-19 shelter-in-place pandemic, this artwork is coming from a place of words and food. So many are finding comfort in the kitchen and it’s invocation of a happier time. By creating this series, I reflect on those sentiments hearth and home by the physical action of meditatively cutting apart a 100-year-old cookbook and - in a Duchampian act - reimagining vintage cooking and kitchen utensils. As a reflection, specifically, upon those Grandmothers we have lost; along with their recipes and memories of foods they prepared. It is also a reflection of great loss; the juxtaposition of the loss of loved ones and the memories and knowledge lost and sentiment of the foods that have been cooked from those books and served upon the fine china, cutlery, and utensils once utilized by families and are now discarded or sold. There is a huge influx of family “heirlooms,” be it silver place settings, china, crystal, and books which held great value for those who acquired it and what is seen as junk to discard by those who inherit it. By repurposing the very books that shaped the lives of these Grandmothers onto the service ware they once used, I hope to honor them and their existence, even when their own families do not or cannot.
A few minutes with Carolyn walking through her Mixed Emotions installation.
