Everything in my Father's wallet/ Everything in my wallet

Approximately 96 (10 x 10 inches), 2 (15 x 15 inches) colour photographs

Everything in my father's wallet ...developed from the discovery of my father's wallet in a box of family memorabilia, ten years after his passing.   The wallet emerged intact, as if it had just been removed from his pocket.   In examining its contents, (55 items including driver's license, old photographs, heart medication prescription, etc.) I became fascinated by how these items built a portrait of this man - an immigrant, labourer, father, husband, hunter...etc.  

Indeed, I began to wonder what the contents of my wallet would reveal about me.   By bringing the contents of the two wallets together the work not only builds two portraits, or suggests clues of a father/daughter relationship, but themes which go beyond the individual owners emerge. For example, my father's wallet contained a Steel Worker's of America Union Card, while mine contained a University Alumni Card, my father's a hunting license and a note permitting him to hunt on private property, while mine contained cinema, gallery and library memberships. These items not only point to activity, but to ways of living. Presented in two grids of approximately 50 photographs each, the relationship between the two raises notions of generational differences, gender differences, and a class/cultural shift resulting from my father's immigration and lack of formal education, while I was born, educated and raised in Canada.

Somewhere In Between Essay by Shirley Madill
Co-published by Cambridge Galleries & Art Gallery of Hamilton
April 2006