Phyllis Davidson
Shelf Life
April 4 - 26, 2008
Opening Reception Friday April 4, 2008 6-9PM
Phyllis Davidson "Yellow Dresser", Oil on Canvas
“And all her shining keys will be took from her, and her cupboards opened, and little things a’ didn’t wish seen; anybody will see; and her wishes and ways will be as nothing.”
Thomas Hardy
Mayor of Casterbridge
“Shelf Life” is a series of paintings which explores cupboards and cabinets; shelves and drawers, their diverse and sundry contents, and the myriad of memories they evoke.
In one form or another these repositories of items are familiar to us all, whether it was your grandmother’s china cabinet; that mysterious cupboard in a long ago home—kept locked; a half-remembered toy shelf; or that carved Chinese box with its multitude of compartments and drawers in which you kept your treasures, these ubiquitous depositories seem to suggest a shared human trait.
The collections of medieval churches: (pieces of the true cross, fragments of apostle’s bones, etc.); the cabinets of curiosities of the 17 th century, and our contemporary museums are larger and grander versions.
In these paintings many of the drawers—possibly laden with a collection of ephemera—are forever closed; many cupboards shut, their contents a mystery. That is as it should be: no shining keys available here.
-Phyllis Davidson
