Thanks to Lunch Ticket for the spotlight on
the “Do I know you?” series by R.L. Gibson.
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Tag: Do I Know You? series
Lessons continue.
vanished
On December 14, 2014, she finally got some peace. Emma Gibson had just 15 days to go until her 93rd birthday, but she just couldn’t go there. My intimate journey with her began 2 years ago today with a phone call.
When I answered that call that told me my father was in the ICU grappling with what would eventually be revealed as fatal injuries, my first thoughts were not for him but for my grandmother. She had been in nursing care with end-stage dementia for a couple of years at that point. And, while she could still recognize me, she was fading fast.
My journey with her through guardianship, conservatorship, and every imaginable health issue possible inspired me to share my passage from fear to resolution. It all ended in a fairly confident summation in artist-statement-format for my July 4th opening of “Do I Know You?” that ended with “The best we can hope for is a few good photos and a really good story about how we got to the end. Smile. Everyone dies.” I meant it at the moment, but…
Sometimes I am a pompous ass.
She’s dead.
She’s not smiling.
I’m not smiling.
She loved me.
I loved her.
I love her still.
I can’t believe she’s gone.
How shocking that I could be still shocked that her loss hurts this badly. It was expected; I thought I was prepared. I was not. Her lessons for me will continue–despite her absence.
Smile. At least you’re not dead.
_________________________________
Heart Breaker.
A CHANGE
in season
I’ve been busy testing a change in process–the addition of color and paint. I am closing in on a new direction for the next series of work that I’m calling “Better than Figs” at the moment.
The new series
examines what it means
to really live.
The series title, Better than Figs, is from Shakespeare’s Anthony & Cleopatra:“O excellent! I love long life better than figs.” Before diving headfirst into production, I sat down to edit the “Do I Know You?” exhibit. It seems that Heart Breaker (pictured left) might be the best way to say goodbye to #DIKY. Is it okay to mourn the loss of mourning? No longer mourning puts closure or finality to the loss of my father. I have guilt about that. My mourning for the loss of the personality I knew as my grandmother has become acceptance. I am grateful to at least have my memories of who she was–even if her memories don’t include me anymore. I finally learned to just “Smile. Because everyone dies.”
If you didn’t get a chance to visit the #DIKY opening in July,
you can see the series by visiting the Do I Know You? page.
♦ ♦ ♦
SHOT from the HIP
TRUE LOVE
departed
My grandparents divorced when my father was a teenager. While my grandmother was bitter, Dad felt under-appreciated & Uncle Darryl sulked, I just thought Grandpa was faux-grouchy prankster.
Our days were filled with ice cream trips, tickle fights, playing house–and the eyebrows. He had the craziest eyebrows EVER. He would drag his fingers across his brow bone until they met in the middle. The resulting woolly-worm brows sent me into an endless spiral of giggling.
He re-married the lovely Anna who developed severe rheumatoid arthritis at a very young age. She suffered dozens of surgeries & joint replacements only to lose most of her mobility. He happily waited on her hand & foot. He carried her to & from bed. He cut her food. He colored her hair.
He LOVED her. I loved him.
At 69, Anna left this world too soon. A few months later after a routine hip surgery, he developed staphylococcal meningitis. His body just quit. The piece inspired by this photograph is entitled “Shot from the Hip,” and the show of which it is a part, Do I Know You? opens in July of 2014 at The Balcony Gallery at The Emporium Center in Knoxville, TN.
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Bated Breath.
meet
MAGGIE B.
My great aunt Mary Magdalene Horton Baker was a hoot. She was divorced young and never re-married or had children of her own. My father, uncle and cousin were HER children, of sorts, but mostly it was ME. She was a leather-tanned wild woman with bleached hair, skin-tight jeans and a bikini top well into her 60s. She was the life of EVERY party, and EVERYONE was invited. I remember the devilish smile and the pooh-poohing of the convention espoused by all the other adults in my life.
So, as a kid in our family, all I really wanted to do was wait until she got off the swing shift to pick me up at midnight in her convertible with the leopard seat covers. We would make our way to her feather painted bedroom & climb into her bed with the red velvet headboard & watch the then, new-fangled “cable TV” & eat cocktail shrimp out of the can.
In July 2005, Maggie B. died of acute respiratory failure due to a 3-year battle with emphysema. She was a social smoker for 60+years but never seemed to have a health concerns. Then at 78 her body just stopped co-operating & said “Enough” despite the fact that she wasn’t done living. I love her so much. This is a pic of her (late-1970s) at approx. 55 years old.
The piece inspired by this photograph is entitled “Bated Breath,” and the show of which it is a part, Do I Know You? opens in July of 2014 at The Balcony Gallery at The Emporium Center in Knoxville, TN.
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FAMILY PHOTOS
…and
FAMILY
HISTORY
I have spent the last few weeks gathering family photos to get a little planning done for DIKY –since most of the hand-drawn patterns are completed. And as I sit and look into the collective face of my family, I find an almost overwhelming responsibility to get it right…
For me. For them.
For the ones I never knew. For the ones that will never know. The key is to not get so bogged down in the responsibility that my ability to work creatively is paralyzed.
But, the faces… I cannot escape the faces.
