Requiem

A REQUIEM: LOVE AFTER DEATH

For Kyle and Lyndsay.

This artwork was made for a friend from days gone by, who is now a friend from now, and a collector of some of the best and most meaningful pieces I have made. She is one of the people who sees into my work and knows that what it means for her, is the truth in the art, and the most important element of my work. Not what it means to anyone else, especially me.

The couple married in their 20’s, in a beautiful ceremony. Tragically, she lost him to a massive heart-attack, very young. No love that profound should perish that swiftly, I felt as I started making this, but life isn’t fair.

My friend mentioned that her husband had once written her a poem, and that she would be interested in seeing if I could interpret it as a commissioned work, some time in the distant future.

I asked if she would share it with me. After reading it, and crying a lot, a vision formed on the edges of my mind, and I set out to see if I could coax it into life. I think it is maybe the best work I have made this year.

As I finished, it occurred to me that I was wrong. Love is one of the few things that survives death. It didn’t perish, it just changed shape.

This was one of those commissions filled with the eery synchronicities that working with someone sometimes brings. When I showed her the mock-up of the work (which she wasn’t expecting because it came to me so easily and so quickly), she told me that not only were their names for each other Sun and Moon, but that purple was their colour. I hadn’t known.

These moments are the chief reason I’m married to the idea of the collective unconscious. They usually come when I’m most tempted to doubt that there are things bigger than me that I don’t understand. Spiritual things, not Sydney Opera House things.

-NM