Family Artwork

[poliphilo]

Among the stuff that came out of the attic are a couple of framed watercolours. They're amateur work and not very good- but the thing is they're signed by someone with a family name who may have been my great-grandmother's brother or possibly her nephew or- who knows? My granny kept them out of sentiment- I suppose- but I don't remember them hanging on her wall. My great-grandmother was a rather good amateur painter and one of her sons was a professional and almost everyone in that lineage seems to have messed about with paints at some time or other. And it continues. My mother did a bit and I do a bit and my sister does more than a bit and my daughter has just published a set of tarot cards from her own artwork. It's nice to know that Uncle Fabian or Cousin Fabian also dabbled but how far should family piety stretch? Should we keep his stuff because of the name or take it down the charity shop in the hope that someone will take a shine to it- which is more than we have done?

And then there are the paintings my granny did in her old age. As a young woman she trained as a woodcarver and her work in that line is excellent and we treasure the examples we have, but her late watercolours and oils are very ordinary. Not up to the standards of the pro she used to be. Hardly worth framing. 

But.

I suppose we'll do what my parents did and put them back into storage and the next generation- or the generation after- can get them out again and see what it thinks....