It is hard to deny the strange feeling of sharing a room with one of your loved ones who has passed on. The implicit silence is an acknowledgement of toil’s end, though at the time, the personal trauma overtakes this thought in the mind of the living. It casts small echoes. Of course, there is the paralyzing remorse, guilt, and overwhelming emotion that come with the passing. We can think of these rooms in psychoacoustical territories as much as we like. Still, in the end, they are either encumbered or fettered by the many memory objects that fade in and out of the moment surrounding the living and the deceased. I remember the feeling of trying to understand everything vividly, but coming away with a head wrapped in proverbial cotton, dull thuds of the kettle bells swinging between my ears. In my case, the case of my mother, her death came overnight.
There was no ramping up of the shape of it. It was overpunctual. Ever since, in the light of a morose clarity, I understand that the death granted to her, in her sleep, in her room, in her home, with my presence, an only child to her born, was likely the best it could have been. It was just too early. Something snapped in me, like a bone in a pestle and mortar, crushed under the weight of an aborted reality, an umbilical extension cut, leaving me cast adrift.
When she was removed, the room presented a minefield of personal debris. Sifting through the emptiness, looking for paperwork, I was left to analyze alarm clocks, books, soiled sheets (a difficult byproduct to stumble upon), and the effects of a lifetime accumulated in dusty drawers and closets, tucked away in boxes within boxes. The exercise of death gave more concern to bureaucracy than to eulogy. This is how we have built our mourning process, making death inconvenient, needing a sanitary approach to tucking away emotions for the sake of birth certificates, death certificates, insurance policies, overpriced coffins with a never-ending selection of handle types, clergy informing you of where and how the body will be disposed of, talk of God, mortality, souls, without recognizing anybody involved with a price that dehumanizes the living.
The rooms slowly become empty. Stillness as dust settles on the carpet, a trace outline of the bedposts, light filtering in, everything looking smaller than you remembered it with the clutter only hours previously. Four walls, your thoughts, time ticking away eerily in your ear, and not a clock or watch in sight. Left to sit, cut up, on the floor. An awkward association forms toward grief, maturity, and the fact that the silence indicates things have indefinitely changed. What to do, where to go, who will inhabit what remains of you, the house, and the wounds you will try to hide. God’s design, apparently.
Ruth Lauer Manenti’s new book, 4 Sides of the Table, published by Editorial RM, reminded me of these rooms we find ourselves in, trudging through complicated emotions, listless hours of waiting, and the eventual absence they will come to present to us. Her book is somber, meditative, and complex as it relates to the death of her mother, who, I believe, is in the book at the end, while also expressing a profoundly humane quality about the passing hours and the complex need for both closeness and isolation in the event of such monumental loss. Ruth has published a previous book, I Imagined It Empty, as the winner of the Star Dummy Award, published in conjunction with Editorial RM, last year, a book that I covered with her on the Nearest Truth Podcast. Both books explore an idea of space through a domestic environment, but both reflect a considered mortality and observational prowess.
Stylistically, both books are interestingly disjointed and out of time, and they feel like they could be Wright Morris photographs, or perhaps offshoots of Dorothea Lange from the FSA period. I am also reminded of Chez Mondrian by André Kertész, or perhaps Edward Weston’s Attic Photo from 1921. There is a softness in Ruth’s images, a sparse gravity that pulls the room, cornbread, and draughting utensils into a period, loosely from 1920-1950, and it gives her work a ghostly, timeless quality that helps undergird its psychological lode. In contemporary terms, I am also slightly reminded of Messrs. McDermott & McGough for their anachronisms.
There is also the performative aspect of the work in which Ruth and June, her mother’s best friend, perform simple tasks independently and together, the brushing of hair, the stacking of plates, the peeling of potatoes, all pale and under an implied layer of gauze that reflects less the theater of performance than it does the re-enactment of mourning. An emphasis on hands also brings the book to a suggestive high point with June becoming something of an effigy for Ruth’s mother, a purposeful examination of detail reminiscent of the many photographs Alfred Stieglitz made of his wife, Georgia O’Keeffe. Stieglitz should also be mentioned, as many of the images here resemble his quiet pictures from the early Twentieth Century. With this in mind, it is essential to stake the claim that Ruth’s photographs are independent from those attributions, but that they stem from a place that is similar in meaning or context.
This is an exceptional book. I feel that it is slightly less visually complicated than her last book, but what is excellent is the evolution of an artist who uses photography and is equally talented in painting and drawing. I feel like this book hits harder in its simplicity, but it is also in tandem value with I Imagined it Empty, and should be seen as a meaningful follow-up. I imagine that Editorial RM took a chance on this one because the previous book sold out so quickly, and I really hope it can become a relationship that continues to be nurtured, as the teamwork has produced significant results.
Ramon Pez must also be noted as the designer. If you are unaware of Ramon’s work, he is a gracious, hardworking designer who finds a way to let the work speak, rather than over-designing like some of his contemporaries. I have been fortunate to cover several of his books and have written in a few he has designed. He managed to keep Ruth’s book in the relevant field for its subject while also keeping it contemporary. I have nothing but admiration for Ruth. I hope she continues and that someday we are also graced with a book of her drawings. Highly recommended.