The Forgotten Initial
2007
Hair, thread, tea towels, antique glass towel bar
50x25x3
The Forgotten Initial is my own memorial for one of my grandmothers - we were very close. On her deathbed, my grandfather permitted me to cut her beautiful hair, which was my most emotional cutting to date. Prior to slipping into a coma, she had been to the beauty parlor to wash her hair, and it was still gorgeous and perfectly white. The tea towels had been given to me earlier from my husband’s grandmother and, unfinished, were missing a cross-stitched initial. As my grandmother’s surname Reynolds was not carried on by a son, it seemed fitting to coil the letter R with her hair to occupy these empty spaces.