Lesley Ann Price – Artists Statement & Story

In 2003 at the age of 85 my darling father took ill with cancer and within weeks he had passed away. His illness was only discovered due to a fall and subsequent x-ray. Unfortunately by this time it had spread to all parts of his body, including his bones, and it was too late for any treatment.

My father, a German Jew, was fortunate enough to leave Germany in 1933 at the age of 13. He came to South Africa and as he could not yet speak English he found schooling very hard. However having a very inquisitive and curious mind and he taught himself. His yearning for knowledge was simply astounding and he read constantly.

Archeology, Music and Mythology were his passion. He read from Encyclopedias, both in German and English. His extensive collection of classical records together with his treasured books had a great influence of my life. It is from him, that I too have a curiosity and yearning for knowledge no matter the subject. He received his first Bollix Movie camera at the age of 13 and was a keen photographer.

“Lieba Papa” is a project inspired by actual postcards passed down to me. In August of 2008 I had the privilege to be granted a fellowship to the Frans Masereel Center, a printmaking facility in Belgium. During my stay a family member from London, presented me with some postcards from my late dad and his father. This was the inspiration to begin working with the images and the multitude of family documents collected by my dad during his lifetime.
The opportunity to show this body of work at the Atlanta Hartsfield Airport in May/June of 2011 allowed me to begin exploring with more sophisticated types of images bringing in graphs, maps and photographs relating to the second world war. As research is extremely important to what I produce, my intent now is to move forward with a body of work that is influenced by the momentous technological breakthroughs that are reaching us with lightning speed with the juxtaposition of the world that moved at a much slower speed 100 years ago.