Tuesday 18 March 2008

Fragments



Thursday is the Spring or Vernal Equinox - this is a time associated with "The Greenman" and above is a picture that I did some years ago.

The original drawing was based on my middle son, when he was a teenager, and this son has also been on my mind these past few weeks, as his wedding takes place over the Easter weekend.

I think that part of my reluctance to be in the studio this past month is to do with my feelings around my sons wedding.

Or let me re-phrase that my feelings around becoming a "Mother in Law"!

Two of my sons are getting married this year. For the past month - I have not set foot in the studio - but I have been tending my garden like there is no tomorrow.

I love my two new daughter-in-laws-to-be. I am overjoyed that my sons are getting married and I am just so proud of all my children and their partners.

Yet somehow these imminent weddings have affected me more than I knew.
I thought I had embraced my age and in some ways I have - apart from the occasional moan about the fact that various parts of my body seem to be hurtling towards the ground - Gravity has a strange effect on the over 50's!

However at another level - I know these weddings are also a milestone in my life, and for the past month I have been in the grey time, the liminal phase of neither here nor there. Somehow, not the same mother I was - and - not yet the Mother in Law I will become.

Tending the garden has been my metaphorical rite of passage - cultivating the soil, pulling the weeds and moving stones. A way of separating from the Mother I was, actively nurturing my children (Although in truth - I have not had to do this for a few years) and moving towards the Mother I will become.

Now - I send them joyfully into this new and exciting phase of their lives, while I take my new place as the "Mother in Law"




This is work in progress that I started to-day. It is going to be composed of fragments. Fragments that I have saved over the years - from pieces that didn't work out, experiments, bits that I liked - but never got around to working into a picture.

Perhaps another metaphor for where I am just now.


Wednesday 12 March 2008

Digital Art Journal Entry



Please click on the picture for a larger view.
Art Journal entry
Sketchbook pages from 1991

As I am not in my studio very much just now - you may find me in
An Artist's Garden