AMALGAM HC AN IMMIGRANT HIS LABOR UNION AND HIS AMERICAN FAMILY IN BROOKLYN (MR) (09 Oct Release)

In a uniquely told immigrant story¸ visual artist Frances Jetter connects her own life to her ancestors’ and their interweaving ties to the 20th century labor movement. The narrative thread unspools with Abram¸ a Polish Jew who immigrates to America for economic opportunity and ? much like his namesake ? takes on a new name¸ ‘Abe’. He is a passionate arbitrator and advocate in his union but an unyielding patriarchal tyrant at home. Throughout¸ readers uncover the convictions and contradictions that make up the tapestry of his life and so many others. Amalgam is populated by impressionistic figures¸ rendered with piercing faces staring down the reader¸ as if out of an old photograph. Some pages are mini epics depicting the struggle of workers¸ others are haunting vignettes of abandoned dolls and forgotten friends. It’s also a love letter to Jetter’s mother¸ Rose¸ who hovers in the artist’s mind like a ghost ? forever impressed upon the stairs¸ at once ephemeral and pervasive¸ like Rose’s lost paper doll. One’s life is not only one’s own¸ but hinges on every other. Twelve years in the making¸ Amalgam¸ true to its name¸ takes a multimedia approach to its story. Presented as a meditation on memory and legacy¸ a kind of summoning occurs out of the loving patchwork of linocuts¸ keyholes¸ and hinges ? and the presence of the dead is felt once again. There is a profound¸ understated moral power in Jetter’s remembrance of loved ones¸ etching their essences in the same linoleum material that made up the floors of her childhood.