I Now Know the Meaning of Life, 2019, Mixed media ink stain on raw canvas, stitching, collage and found objects (medals) (Made with Holy Water), 34 x 27

Unconditional Love

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The final group of paddle dolls belong to the Unconditional Love Series, which is dedicated to the artist’s mother Olivia Lorraine Edwards. While also performing the function of commemorating a lost one, these paintings are much more personal and display individual, personal traits of the artist’s mother: the plaid dress, the vibrant hot pink color, Milagros, which call down the protection of a particular saint from the Catholic tradition. Further protection is granted by the incorporation of the ankh sign (“life”) and the udjat sign (“well-being”), hieroglyphic signs with ritual significance. The theme of “Unconditional Love” is very much present in the piece, “Descendants” in which an image of the artist, holding her young cousin, is tenderly placed in the pubic triangle as a votive wish for a blessed afterlife for the eternal mother, source of unconditional love.

Edwards captures the central motive of these works when she states, “In making these I thought about how humans (in this instance females) are connected to the whole in a universal manner. Humans are 70% water, and thus our DNA defines our core identity with this substance.” Solange Ashby, Egyptologist.