LAURIE ZUCKERMAN LECTURES ON MEMORY JUGS FOR THE REMARKABLE WOMEN SERIES

Laurie Zuckerman was invited to speak on Memory Jugs for the Remarkable Women Series sponsored by A Place for Every Woman's Spirituality in Fort Collins, Colorado. The well-attended lecture was held on April 4th. Since there is so little known about folk art memory jugs, I concentrated on my personal history with making memory jugs and memorial jugs. I plan to offer a workshop through this women's center later this spring or summer.

http://www.everydaymysteries.com/Remarkable%20Women.htm

"Laurie Zuckerman constructs enigmatic memory jugs from antique and vintage found objects. She has conducted memory jug workshops at the Loveland Art Museum and the Artists' Nook in Fort Collins. she has exhibited her altar installations, memory jugs, and shrine photography since the mid-1990's, at the Elmhurst Art Museum in Chicago, the University of Northern Colorado, the Loveland Art Museum, the Fort Collins Museum of Contemporary Art, and the Durango Arts Center.

"Memory jugs, an American vernacular folk craft from the Victorian era, are believed to honor the dead with personal tokens once belonging to the deceased -- shells, jewelry, toys, buttons, beads, etc. Some art historians propose that memory jugs are linked to Southern African-American funerary traditions, and may have been used to decorate their gravesites.

"Laurie's memory jugs appear in the 2008 book by Lynne Perella: Art Making Collections and Obsessions (Quarry Publishers). In 1999, Laurie was included, along with 99 other woman altarmakers, in a book by Kay Turner, A Beautiful Necessity: The Art and Meaning of Women's Altars.

"Laurie was born in Los Angeles and received her B.A. in Fine Arts from the U. of California, Berkeley; and her B.F.A. in Painting from the U. of Oregon. She is a painting and drawing instructor at Front Range Community College, and lectures publicly on altarmaking to universities, colleges, museums, galleries, libraries, and arts organizations."