• titled: "I Think of My Old Home" (under image)
• signed: "Secunda" (lower right below image)
• medium: mixed-media collage; relief etching printed by Effram Wolff in Los Angeles consisting of six flat colors separated by white relief lines and two blended colors; eight collage elements and three linear elements hand-drawn with colored pencil by Secunda.
• dimensions: image size: 10" x 2" with 5/8" embossed white margins and light brown background bleed to paper edge; paper size: 16" x 12"
• edition: 25 prints, numbered 1/25 to 25/25 (lower left below image)
• edition number: 94-03-025
• published by: Pierian Press Fine Art Editions

Introduction, by C. Edward Wall

The title of this work comes from Chinese literature. The famous ninth-century poet, Li Po, wrote:

Ch'uang ch'ien, ming yueh kuang
I shih, ti shang shuang
Chu t'ou, wang ming yueh
Ti t'ou, su ku shang.

Before my bed shines the bright moonlight;
I wonder, is there frost on the ground.
Raising my head, I look at the bright moon;
Lowering my head, I think of my old home.

The title is derived from the last three characters (six words in English translation) of this 1000-year-old poem. In the image the hills and fields are more beautiful than they ever were in reality, when one toiled to bring in the harvest under the brutish August sun; and the house, though lovely in its special way, is a little crooked, a little decrepit, a little askance - suggesting that it was not as beautiful as now remembered.

This work deals with one of the most universal and poignant of all emotions: longing for the past; sadness for parents and other loved ones, now gone; memories of simpler, carefree times. With the passage of time and distance, we often tend to remember the good and dismiss the negative, developing ever more beautiful and treasured memories. All this, and more, is embodied in this special work.