I don't really do a lot of painting, not confidently anyways, and the only painting I really do now is purposely messy and unrefined, but this! This is the only painting I have ever done that I am really proud of.
(Approx 33 x 23)
(Detail)
I was thinking a lot about the idea of 'Sonder' when I was painting this.
The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows describes 'Sonder' as such:
n. the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives that you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk.
I don't know the people depicted in the painting, and I most likely never will. Their identities are lost and only a shell of their beings are left behind. I'm left guessing who they were and this fascinates me, the possibilities are endless, and I will never know which ones are right.
I'll figure out how to post photos on here properly at some point I swear, it's harder than I anticipated!
The text in the background of all of the paintings in the Absence and Presence project are not my own, they were sourced from the internet, but the reference photos used to paint the fabric (in part 1) and figures here are my own.
Any feedback is appreciated so let me know what you think!
Also if anyone has any tips of resizing photographs i'd be really grateful :)