In a similar way that stories are passed, from one caretaker to another, inherited objects maintain many of the same properties. I have been the recipient of a small collection of items, all of which have minimal monetary value, however their familial and cultural value is significant. My mother quite recently gave me a spoon - larger than a dessert spoon or tablespoon, but smaller than something I consider for serving. It was something of a family joke. In my earlier days of learning to bake for my own family, I would attempt to replicate some of the recipes that are recorded in my mother’s recipe book, and find that the results were lacking. I discovered that ingredients noted in her book as ‘Tablespoon’ quantities did not reference a metric tablespoon, but a much larger instrument. Additionally, my mother would, in her heavy-handed way, use a spoon heaped high. My meticulous levelling resulted in custard that was thin and bland. When my mother gave me one of the ‘family’ spoons for Christmas, I was utterly delighted. It is a key to my ancestral legacy. It isn’t even an inherently beautiful spoon, but it has a patina of age, a legacy of use embedded in the surface.
A Treasury, 2023. Test work, not installed formally.
