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Chainmaking In Chain Making, Caines struggles with the sense of displacement and disconnectedness that marks her family’s personal history. In an effort to retrieve their story, she presents the viewer with two large, metal link chains, the metaphoric and literal “link” to her past. Her great-grandmother was born in Cradley Heath, England, a community in which most of the men made metal chains for a living; and the place of rupture in her family life. Each link of the rusted, worn chains are inscribed with the name and age of a child from Middlemore Homes in Birmingham, the orphanage from which Davies’ was deported. The massive chains spill out of two large, low, well-used metal wash buckets, each engraved with a statement from a Middlemore Annual Report. The bucket representing Britain situates us directly inside Middlemore, and references the living conditions endured by the children: “there was an iron bucket containing a fire, made of chips and dried ferns, which gave them some warmth”. The bucket evoking Canada narrates a caretaker’s attempt to clean off the children upon their arrival to Canada, so that they might more easily be selected by Canadian families: “I dipped most of their heads in a large bucket of water and left the children to dry them with their handkerchiefs”. The engraved texts are rusty too, signaling the deterioration of time and memory. This is Caines’ post-memory work, and she remakes her narrative in an effort to locate herself within the history of women in her family who have struggled for survival and independence.
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