Month 6/12
February was a strange month—partially optimistic with spring approaching but also filled with doubt as many decisions needed to be made. Time is ticking, and I am halfway through my project. I met some lovely people through a few courses I got involved in. One is run by the Good Grief Festival, based in Bristol, whose work I always appreciate. They provide online webinars and workshops on grief education, psychology, and the science behind it. One of my favorite scientists studying the grieving brain, Mary-Frances O’Connor, was part of it, sharing her new book on the grieving body. I am excited to get it soon when it reaches the UK!
Another course I am doing now is run by Annie Frost Nicholson in collaboration with the Loss Project. I am grateful for her holding space for our group, where we share, create, and sit with our grief.
I am loving Conscious Grief book by talented Tara Nash- a spiritual psychologist, grief coach and Kundalini yoga practitioner.
I have finished drawing all 215 letters! Yes, I managed to get through it. That was the plan—to get the hardest bit out of the way. Now, I will be working on selecting drawings to include in the installation, as not all of them will fit.
The main challenge of reading the letters and drawing them was the variety of emotions that seeped through the pages. There is so much tenderness, but also so much confusion and, on some occasions, anger. This shows how complex grief is as an emotion, and how grieving, as a process, is multi-dimensional and not bound by time. According to Mary-Frances, 60% of people are resilient enough to move through grief naturally. Grief is learning, adapting to a new reality, rewiring our brains, mindfully dosing it, being present, and noticing the opportunities for connection and joy.
I could only handle three letters in one sitting and had to create a sort of emotional wall for protection. I keep telling myself that I can’t fix this—the only thing I can do is take responsibility for honouring the authors and those to whom the letters are written, by telling their story and responding to them with my drawings. A dialogue between two strangers. There is a clear need for these shadows to arise, for people to be heard.
It is interesting to notice how grief transforms lives—new shoots arise, hope emerges amidst the darkness and pain, new skills are learned, self-discoveries are made. Looking at other people’s grief helped me examine my own in more detail instead of numbing it. I looked through some letters and notes my dad left. He always left brief, descriptive notes if we missed each other—telling where he was, when he would be back, what was in the fridge, what he had done, and what needed to be done. These made me laugh and cry at the same time.
Why am I drawn to some letters more than others? Some stories sink deep within me. Some drift past. I guess we connect to what we store in our own memory bank.
In terms of the creative process, I feel like I am in my own bubble, boiling in this grief juice, and the more I am in it, the more I want to be here. I have reduced my perfectionist expectations by acknowledging that mistakes will happen and that imperfection is fine. In the end, this is my project. I am fully absorbed in the process, and the rest of the world doesn’t exist. This is probably not the healthiest or best way to approach it. I push myself to meet other artist friends, to switch my attention, and to see other shows before I return to my own deep waters.
One of the revelations was how somatic this experience is—making this kind of work. The physiology of grief is scientifically proven; it lives within us and manifests in various ways. I have created a selection of full-size figure drawings mapping grief inside me. My throat chakra is struggling, my chest is congested. Breath is what pushes grief through. Breath is everything.
My art has always been reluctant to be close to form, so abstracting it even more was an interesting approach—creating the fluidity of emotion. Reading each letter is a kind of ritual, a meditation. With each breath, I visualize pictures, imagine the characters from the letters, and guess what they feel. It is all a big guess, a try, an attempt to connect. It is a disciplined, conscious way to sit with discomfort until it shifts and a drawing grows—something new emerges.
I am working on a new piece incorporating frequently used phrases from the letters: I miss, I am sorry, I hope, I wish. Nearly every letter contains one or more of these. The fabric is embroidered with these words.
I created a scent in collaboration with my very good friend Laura who runs Evolve Beauty. Together we combined a perfect blend of organic aromatherapy oils that stimulate curiosity, soothe the aching heart while giving you a glimpse of the abyss. Cypress oil is the main character here with the legend of the boy’s grief was such that it transformed him into a cypress tree, a classical symbol of mourning. I am working on the way to present it at my show in August.
It is fascinating to observe how varied people’s understanding of energy and continuity is—how some feel their loved one’s presence, while others do not. How our religious and spiritual beliefs shift or newly form. How we see the void behind the vanishing point.
