Maman Disait--Collages by Rhea
http://www.fawi.net/proverbes/MamanDisait.html

Collages and Post Cards of the French proverbs of everyone's experiences!

Maman Disait ("What maman said")
Dedicated to
Rita L. St. Germain Côté, 1919-1982 (Maman)
Proverbes en Français--Collages and Post Cards
by
Rhea Côté Robbins

Artist Statement
http://www.fawi.net/proverbes/MDAS.html

Biography of the artist who is also the
Author of Wednesday's Child
(http://www.rhetapress.com)

Stop by to purchase, view the collages and leave your favorite proverb in our book!

American Folk Festival
August 26, 27, 28 2011
The American Folk Festival on the Bangor Waterfront brings the world to Bangor.

The American Folk Festival is a large-scale, three-day event. Held each year at the end of August in downtown Bangor, Maine, Penobscot River front, the Festival presents the music and dance from the many cultures that make up America today.

What also awaits you at the American Folk Festival
--Marketplace offering unique, handcrafted items and "Taste of Maine" treats for sale
http://www.americanfolkfestival.com/

Commentary: The collages are the story of my experience of the proverbs, sayings, maxims that maman disait, had access to, from where I do not know, but without meaning to, passed onto me.

I wanted to see these proverbs in print--in a frame--as home graffiti--kitchen art--or to experience the French in places one has seen in English. To render the French on the wall as a way of marking the spaces as chez-nous pour nous. To simply have French on the wall.

A proverb, or saying, pronounces a final word or explanation--understanding, giving insight, to the situations of the world. A way of ordering life--holding authority, or sway, over the uncontrollable--so that it becomes controllable. Proverbs as pagan spiritual praying--in co-existence with the creator.

Not that maman was unique, but just the opposite. The proverbs, sayings, were ubiquitous--everywhere--and understood by many. The point of exchange is unselfconscious understood culture transference.

This show is not simply an exercise in nostalgia, but how I choose to reclaim for myself, the proverbs, and to give meaning to them as I see them--part of the everyday magic of life.

Rhéa Côté Robbins, Brewer, Maine
daughter of
Rita St. Germain Côté, Waterville, Maine
daughter of
Victoire Gagnon St. Germain Daigle
Wallagrass, Maine