My nana passed away this past week, and I’m navigating what “healthy” grieving looks like (this is my first time losing someone close to me). It’s strange because it feels like the world should’ve stopped spinning, and time would’ve halted after she passed away; however, that’s not what happened.

Life kept moving forward, and at first, I thought I was doing a pretty alright job keeping up. I spent that Tuesday with my family and then drove back to school the next day. I tried to stay strong and to contain the heavy emotions until the weekend/funeral. To an extent, I was “successful” in doing so. I think that I must’ve looked fine to most people; however, I was (and still am) inwardly grieving someone special. While I was in this deep emotional state, I decided to do a plein air painting to temporarily distract myself.

Two of my friends came with me, and I decided to paint the friend who was sitting under the tree. At the time, I double checked my colors and was satisfied with the result. In that moment, I had properly portrayed the sunny day, and I had correctly mixed and painted the colors that I saw.

Three days after painting, I pulled out my artwork and was baffled at what I saw. The colors were dull and quite desaturated. I almost didn’t recognize the painting.

The brush strokes appear uneasy.

The colors are muddy.
The overall render is hazy.
The figure looks almost “phantom” like.

Perhaps these are visual representations of the deep sadness that I was experiencing during that moment? My initial knee-jerk reaction was to paint over these rough spots; however, I decided not to.

Why?

Sure, maybe it would’ve been a “prettier” painting had I made the adjustments. But then I thought, “would that be fair?” Afterall, this is what I saw, and this is what life temporarily looked like through my eyes. I thought I was doing a good job “holding in” the heavy emotions… but they found another way to come through, evidently.

It’s true that I was intensely sorrowful while painting this piece, but I was also reflecting on the good memories with nana during this time, too. And maybe… that’s enough reason for me to leave the painting as is… because I don’t want to erase the good while attempting to cover up the bad.

As I painted, I was flooded with warm memories and feelings of the good times with nana despite the heaviness that I felt in my heart.

While I was painting, I thought about how much my nana loved visiting the Florida Keys. I also remembered standing on the dock with her in Islamorada and watching the nurse sharks swim by.

I smiled thinking about the time she gifted me a dozen GIANT chocolate-covered strawberries for my 16th birthday. They were so good, and I decided to eat them all within an hour. Shortly afterwards, I had the most diabolical stomachache. I wonder why? I’ll never forget the look of shock on her face and laughter that followed once I told her just how quickly I ate all twelve giant chocolate-covered strawberries.

I felt a wide range of complex emotions during this session, and I believe they can be seen on the surface of the canvas. This isn’t my best work, but it is my most vulnerable. At first, I hated the transparency of my feelings within this painting—but maybe that’s not a bad thing?

“Grief, I’ve learned, is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give but cannot. All of that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.” – Jamie Anderson

Brushstrokes of Grief

The Unpaved Path