The Dinner Party
“Don’t cry,” she said to me days before she died, “I’ve had a full and very happy life.”
I’ve written about my mother Jessie before and some of the things she’s told me – among them how to approach difficult tasks, and how to rectify mistakes made – and I try to heed her words. (See Elbow Grease and Art Imitates Life)
Jessie was a high school art teacher, and she painted in both oil and water color. Not interested in selling her work, she never exhibited, but gave her paintings to friends and family, many whom sat for her, portraiture being a favorite genre. (See Still Life)
She was also an avid museum-goer with eclectic taste in art, and we went to many memorable art exhibits together. One was Judy Chicago’s multi-media installation The Dinner Party that first opened in San Francisco in 1979 and a year later came to New York’s Brooklyn Museum where Jessie and I saw it.
My mother greatly admired Judy Chicago, the contemporary American artist, who is now still active in her 80s. As you may know The Dinner Party Is considered the first epic feminist work of art. To create it Chicago built a massive, 48 foot long triangular table with 39 place settings, each with a dinner plate bearing the name of a prominent woman either from history or myth with designs or symbols denoting the woman’s life and accomplishments – Sappho, Queen Elizabeth I, Sacajawea, Sojourner Truth, Susan B Anthony, Margaret Sanger, Emily Dickinson, and Georgia O’Keeffe among them.
Each place setting also boasted ceramic cutlery, a chalice, and a richly embroidered napkin, and throughout the work the artist drew vulva-like images leading some detractors to label the work pornographic. “Too many vaginas!”, said one.
But of course the artist’s mission in creating The Dinner Party was to celebrate women who for too long had been relegated to the back pages of human history. Critics hailed it as an important and brilliantly conceived feminist manifesto.
In 2007 The Dinner Party became part of the Brooklyn Museum’s permanent collection, and how I would have loved to see it there once again with my mother! But it wasn’t to be, several years earlier, after a brief hospitalization my mother had died. (See My Game Mother)
During those final heart-wrenching days I wept at her bedside and she chided me.
“Don’t cry,” she said to me days before she died, “I’ve had a full and very happy life.”
That was over 20 years ago, and those words – the last my mother told me – comfort me still.
Jessie
–Dana Susan Lehrman
Dana Susan LehrmanThis retired librarian loves big city bustle and cozy country weekends, friends and family, good books and theatre, movies and jazz, travel, tennis, Yankee baseball, and writing about life as she sees it on her blog World Thru Brown Eyes!
www.WorldThruBrownEyes.com
May we all have that grace and equanimity when the time comes. Your mother sounds like a wonderful person and you have some wonderful memories. I love that she was a fan of The Dinner Party, which was quite scandalous at the time. Way to go, Jessie!
Thanx Khati.
I don’t mean to be maudlin, but recently I watched two good friends die with grace and equanimity as well – a good lesson.
Sorry to hear about losing your friends, although it seems the experience was as good as it could be. We all die, and having a good death can be a wonderful thing, hard as it is. It can make our mortality more bearable.
Thanx Khati, and as a physician yourself you will best understand my father’s words.
He was a wonderful GP, beloved by his patients. When he was terminally ill he told me,
I’m a doctor dealing with life and death all these years, and so how can I be afraid to die?
Those words surely comforted me!
Your dad sounds like a great guy. I do think that people who see the death process as part of life have a different perspective, and they are in the minority in most European + cultures. Maybe the dads will have their day in June.
Yes
Your mother’s final words were indeed comforting. The way things are looking in our country now, perhaps we need Judy Chicago’s voice once more.
Yes indeed Laurie, may the long fight for women’s rights not be for naught, endangered as it seems now!
I also saw The Dinner Party at the Brooklyn Museum, and loved it! How great that you and your mother saw it together. I can imagine how comforting her final words must have been. I’m sure both of our mothers would be shocked and appalled by what is happening now in our country!
Glad you’ve seen it too Suzy!
Yes my mother’s final words were a comfort.
And yes indeed our mothers’ generation would not be happy with our country’s current state of affairs!
Sweet tribute to your mom, Dana, and I’m glad you got to see The Dinner Party. I saw that original 1979 installation in San Francisco and my women friends all were inspired by it. In our Reconstructionist holiday services we use a poem by Judy Chicago (I hadn’t realized she was a poet). Very feminist. Let’s hope the younger generation finally wakes up.
Mare, glad you saw The Dinner Party in San Francisco, come east and we can go together to see it again in Brooklyn!
I didn’t know Judy Chicago was a poet as well!
I’ve never seen “The Dinner Party” in person, Dana, but certainly well know of it and wish to see it in person on one of my visits to NYC (yeah; even some of us guys can be moved by feminist art).
And bless your dear mother, not only for her museum going example but, as Khati noted, for her “grace and equanimity” as she neared her end. And what a beautiful tribute you have written for — and, I imagine, to — her.
Thanx John, and yes I know some of you guys are sensitive souls!
And yes I did feel I was writing to my mother!
p.s. I assume you know, Dana, that “The Dinner Party” is housed in a wing of the Brooklyn Museum endowed by Elizabeth Sackler, a feminist and philanthropist who, happily, is is no way implicated in the oxycontin scandals of other members of her family who benefitted from its sale.
Ah thanx John!
I also saw The Dinner Party, although not with my mother. She would have loved it, though, as she became an outspoken feminist late in her life. I like how you use your and your mother’s common taste in art as an example of other commonalities.
Thanx Kathy, so glad you saw The Dinner Party!
Dana, beautiful final words from a well-loved mother.
Though I’ve not seen The Dinner Party, I am of course quite familiar with it. Judy Chicago did a solo show at the Rose probably 25 years ago about the Holocaust! It was an ambitious, expensive show. She spent a lot of time installing it and then gave many lectures, which I attended. She complained a lot that The Dinner Party didn’t have a permanent home at the time, but that has been remedied.
And now we will all have to take to the streets again!
Thanx Betsy, yes it seems like we must battle again.
How wonderful that Judy Chicago exhibited at the Rose. And when you next come to New York we can see The Dinner Party!
Dana, a very moving piece and an interesting education about The Dinner Party exhibit. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of it, which probably shows how deep my knowledge of art goes. The words your mother uttered sound like ones my mother used toward the end of her long life. The older I get, the more I understand what she and your mother meant: it’s fine; I’ve had a good life. I’ll probably say something similar to those surviving me as well. BTW, my dad was an artist, painting in oils and pastels, and his passion for painting carried him all the way to 97.
Thanx Jim, come to New York and we can see The Dinner Party, and bless the memories of your folks!
Wow, it’s so rare (I think) that a dying person actually utters such wonderfully chosen words. Your whole story leading up to that final exchange was quite engrossing. Thank you.
Thanx for your kind words Dale, my mother’s final words did indeed comfort me.
Because of COVID, I was not able to visit my Mom before she died in April 1st of 2020. We had a tele-visit planned for the next day.I often speculate on what she would have said.
The loss of a dear friend in October of ’21 was the first time I had heard the heartwarming phrase “May her memory be a blessing.” I am sure that your Mom’s always will be for you.
Thanx Dave, it will be, and so sorry for your losses.