I read an Iris Murdoch novel recently where the retired protagonist was described as existing in the ‘relaxed banality of a life without goals’. I was definitely feeling like that after my retirement, so I started to pick up various challenges presented by social media. Some weeks ago there was ‘Inktober’, where you draw something in ink every day, according to various prompts, for the month of October and then post it. That was fun and somewhat challenging, but, guess what, October ended as it always does, on October 31. So, after that what I found to do was the #15weekportrait challenge hosted on Instagram by artist @ajalper. It’s just like it sounds – you paint a portrait a week for 15 weeks, posting it on Instagram with appropriate hashtags, and hopefully you improve your skills as you go along. That has brought me to week seven, almost the halfway mark, and a portrait of my Mom that I thought I wouldn’t let go by without a blog post.
I had painted my Mom several times, but never my ‘young’ Mom, the way she looked when I first met her back in the 1950’s. So, painting her this way was a little like looking at her through my baby eyes many, many years after the fact! She was quite an influence and taught us to be honest (see my brother’s post on how honest he is), industrious (that’s why I like having goals, I guess) and creative. We lost her five years ago now and she is the first person, that, when she died, I had the distinct feeling that she wasn’t dead at all. I could see her face in every flower and still feel her in the elements, and certainly she has gone on living in her descendants.
7 weeks of Portrait challenge subjects from the upper corner down and across: My friend’s granddaughter, my niece, granddaughter #2, granddaughter #5, granddaughter #4, the hub, and Mom.