Vase of Flowers - 2025 09 08

 

Vase of Flowers - 2021 11 04 - graphite, ink, highlighter felt pen on paper - 8" x 10"

I made this drawing four years ago. My Mom had moved home with me and my husband after she aged out of the mental health group housing where she had resided for 40 years. She turned 91 her first day home. She was a frail elder with complex needs and we were immediately in an "all hands on deck" situation. 

My brother lives across the continent in and around New York City. He was a critical member of our caregiving team and made a point of sending flowers as we navigated one milestone after another. 

I have always loved the look of fresh cut flowers in a vase. I have never felt comfortable drawing them. I knew I could never replicate the colours, shapes, and natural beauty of the bouquet. It didn't stop me from trying!

This drawing caught my attention when I was recently rummaging through one of my piles of drawings. The date tells me that I made this drawing on Day Four after Mom moved in. I remember how overwhelmed and unprepared I was feeling at the time. I also remember making the drawing for my Mom, and feeling like I had not captured the spirit of the moment. But I kept the drawing nonetheless. Actually, Mom insisted on keeping it. It hung on her wall throughout her time with us.

Later, after Mom passed, I was clearing out her suite and found this drawing. Now I had to keep it because it was part of my Mom, it was part of my life. So I put it in the collection of drawings I keep in the attic and even though I rarely look at them, I cannot bear to part with.

Now here the drawing is, in my hands again, and I love it. It is now up on the wall again, singing its mysterious incantation of line, tone, colour and shape. It inspires me to draw more flowers and trust that my observation and skill will reveal something to me that I could not otherwise see.

I suppose that is what drawing does for me. Like writing and music, something is made sensible to me, that was otherwise confusing, baffling, and frustrating. Drawing helps me find a way to understand and take comfort in the drawing itself.

Writing about drawing transforms a visual, sensory experience into words, words that help me explain, to myself, what I am part of, what life means, and what to do next.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Creative Works - 2025 01 24

Image
  Acrylic ink and brush, glass pen, pen and ink on paper 9" x 6" Last evening my neighbour, and friend, Louise, came over for a drawing session. For many years we have passed each other on the street, this was our first time sitting down together to draw. I laid out a selection of papers, brushes, graphite, glass pens, ink pens, and acrylic inks on the dining room table. We used a collection of glass shot glasses for mixing ink washes and tones.  We started at 7 pm and finally wrapped up at 10 pm.  I was surprised by the drawing I made. It is a combination of techniques I have been exploring since I first started drawing in my late teens. A descriptive, dynamic contour line giving a sense of the edge of form, giving definition for a form to emerge. Symbolic markings of triangles, circles and short lines. Organic tracings of splash marks, their reach extending into exploratory threads. Tonal washes that give substance to shapes and definition between the emergence of shape...
Read more

Magic and Mark-making - 2025 03 20

Image
  Pencil crayon, pen and ink, acrylic ink on paper, 6 1/2" x 5" Last night I decided to stay home and work on my drawing instead of going out to take part in an evening with the Vancouver Folk Song Society.  It was hard to make the choice, because both of these activities are my contribution to the antidote for authoritarianism and feel equally important.  I had a key pattern in progress and I was ready to put the third, final layer of lines, colour and washes. I was curious to see how it would turn out and that is where I put my energy. In his book, "Celtic art: The methods of construction", George Bain has a chapter on Key Patterns. I have added information from his book to give background about the meaning and significance of key pattern design. Some Chinese key patterns belong to periods prior to BC 1,000. In the British Museum there is an Egyptian carving showing a key pattern and interlacing dating BC 3500 - BC 3000. Square and diagonal key patterns engraved o...
Read more

Step pattern - 2025 03 04

Image
  Pen and ink, ink wash on paper - 5 1/2" x 5 1/2" The last time I worked with Celtic knots I was extricating myself from an abusive domestic situation. I was ending an eighteen year marriage to an emotionally abusive husband. I have been triggered by the current situation in the US and global geopolitics, especially Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Ukraine’s fight for sovereignty. Puzzling out the Celtic knot and step patterns helps me transcend a state of traumatic brain injury and shift my creative problem solving back into recovering the agency, autonomy and empowerment I possess. The step pattern provides structure and infinite variation in expression. The basic structure of the step pattern is a grid subdivided by a pre-determined number. In the case of this drawing, I was experimenting with the grid subdivided into increments of five. This resulted in the step pattern based on five shapes. In this drawing the grid has been laid out by hand. There is an organic variance...
Read more