In Memory of Childhood, 2024

Jun 19

Written By Natasha Wein

WANDER Gallery, 34 Depot St, Pittsfield, MA

It is because of my siblings that I know how to play. We grew up fairly unsupervised and feral playing in suburban and rural parts of California, Massachusetts, and New Zealand. Raised without a television and with two precocious older siblings, it was our time exploring the natural world and building our own fantasy worlds that instilled in me unbounded curiosity, a sense of humor, and joy in learning, building, and problem solving.

My relationships with my siblings haven't always been simple; my brother and I didn’t get along as kids and my sister and I grew in different directions in adolescence. Whether we were making our own rube goldberg machines, writing puppet shows with our stuffed animals, making and solving outdoor puzzle treasure hunts, performing amateur acrobatics for our parents, or kicking around a soccer ball while eating a bag of baby carrots, play and humor have always been a way of returning to a simpler and more connected way of being together.

Since our parents’ divorce and the selling of our childhood home, we are no longer children with a home to return to. As I remember some of the most unburdened and uninhibited moments of my life with the people I love most—and feeling a sense of time scarcity with them moving forward—I paint in memory of childhood.