Love's Labors: An installation by Leslie Lyman at the White-Ellery House

September 23 – 26, 2021
On view from 10:00 am -5:00 pm Thursday – Saturday and 1:00-4:00 pm on Sunday
Free and open to the public. Reservations encouraged.

White-Ellery House
Cape Ann Museum Green
13 Poplar Street, Gloucester, MA

Love's Labors asks the viewer to look at the everyday work of women. The steady cooking, folding, stitching, mending, washing of domestic life. This type of work accumulates little tasks, little tasks that require consistency, constancy and care. Efforts that are often unseen and unacknowledged while also being critical to the daily functioning of a household. Making the invisible visible is essential to truly telling Herstory, over a lifetime and through generations.

Leslie Lyman Artist Statement

I create intimate impressions that mark and remember what history fails to tell us about the everyday lives of women – the daily efforts, the steady presence, the invisible toil, the love and the loss that we all experience.

My objects and settings stand in perpetual tribute to this caregiving – women’s work – that persists through generations. My work deliberately blends old and new, fully aware that there are stories embedded deep within them and knowing that recollection, sentiment, intention and attention are passed on to the lives of other women.

My art is informed by a lifetime of caregiving and an understanding of the historical lineage from which this work comes. There is evidence all around us. I document this evidence to increase awareness, understanding and appreciation of the quiet beauty, the many frustrations, and the enduring labor of nurturing.

Admission is free, reservations are encouraged.