Cairns painted with every color in my Derwent Graphitint pan set. It’s my humble attempt at a small memorial on paper and a prayer in response to what is happening in the world around.
I recently read that Claude Monet was very ashamed and guilt ridden to be painting while ww1 wreaked havoc around. He wrote on Dec 1, 1914 : ‘’ I feel ashamed to think about my little researches into form and color while so many people are suffering and dying.” He was working on the now famous water lilies series. Sixty five years earlier in his life, his father had given him a choice ‘go to war or give up painting’ He went to war then, rather than give up painting. He served in French military in Algeria. According to https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/blog/monet-and-the-flowers-of-war-concert, “ Monet felt his late paintings were an attempt at healing. They were his artistic response to the traumatic events of the war and arguably the greatest climax to any artist’s creative career”. Many years ago I saw the paintings during our trip to France - but never really grasped the depth nor beauty of the paintings. Hope I get another chance to see ‘ the two rooms filled with 22 enormous panels - more than 80 square meters of canvas. ‘ I can’t imagine the pain and trauma he must have felt.
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