Pennsylvania Dutch Art: A Tribute

Sometimes I totally shock myself and that's putting it nicely.  Sometimes I feel like a total dummkopf (excuse my French) and that's closer to the point.

Once before, as I recall, I talked about the Dutch Masters and mentioned how embarrassing it was when late in life I discovered they were 'connected' to a country called Holland...The Netherlands…where I now live!

The same thing happened with the 'Pennsylvania Dutch' term I grew up with my entire life in America.  They lived in Pennsylvania...DUH...but the Dutch part never meant a thing to me.  Once I figured out the Dutch Masters, the Dutch part of Pennsylvania started to make sense.  Bingo, right?  Wrong.  And this is when language is so crazy-making.  The Dutch this time has nothing to do, technically, with Holland/The Netherlands...where I now live.  Instead, it's about Germany, whose language is Deutsch...becoming the folk-rendered 'Dutch' when Pennsylvania is added, especially when talking about their folk-art, tole painting.

Kath recently said "Obviously the obvious eludes me."

Now that we've got that settled, I present you with Pennsylvania Dutch tole painting that has surrounded me the last year here in our Dutch apartment...not in Germany but in Holland.  And by a Dutch artist, not German or Pennsylvanian.  Every piece in the above collage has seeped into my blood as though it were my own heritage...painted by a woman I've never met but whose lineage feels like mine.  Remember all those times I've said I feel like I've come Home!

In fact, last week I found out sister Ruth (in America) "just started tole painting, cultivating [her] dormant Swedish roots from Grandma Olive."  Tole painting comes not only from Germany but from Scandinavia as well.  My Grandma Olive passed on her artistic flare to our mom who in turn passed it on to us 8 kids.

Now, watch this:  my Dutch wife Astrid's grandmother was from Germany before she moved to Holland, here where Astrid's mother was then born in 1924.  Astrid is an artist in her own right, straight from her mother's line.  Suddenly our lineages have criss-crossed in more ways than one.  When you marry into this art and come from it yourself, it's...(are you ready?)...Double Dutch!  In a Germanic sort of way.

I write more about Astrid's mom (with a photo of her) at my In Soul blog, in case you're interested.  I wish I had met her.  At least I have a sense of who she was, which I honor this month, 7 years since her death.  In this I honor all our moms who have helped shape who we are...even those we've married into.

Helena Jacoba Therese Wijdekop van Leeuwen
1 Aug 1924 - 17 Jan 2004

May you rest in peace.