Today has been one of those blissful days in the studio. Fire going, radio playing and relatively uninterrupted time to get lost in moving pigment around the canvas.
This is Seven, the dog from Mulan WA. The decision to leave him behind filled me with so much sadness the day our plane took off from Mulan. That morning he ate a huge meal, lay in the sunny green grass outside my duplex with his friend, another community dog.
The first time I glimpsed Seven was when heading out on an evening walk along the desert road. He was in the tall grass on the edge of town, and I asked “Are you going to sleep in there ?” He watched me all the way up the road. The next evening his face appeared at my door. He became my best friend for the next 5 months, following me everywhere, waiting for me everyday at the classroom door, ready to walk home. The wonderfully strange thing about the last day, was that he did not follow me for the first and last time. He looked content, happy and healthy. I had fattened him up ready for my absence. To leave him behind was the hardest thing I have ever done.
In leaving Seven I had to ask myself questions I barely knew the answer to. Seven actually belonged to LB (who had six other dogs) - was it ok to take another person’s dog assuming I knew better. Seven would have to be fenced in if he came with me, how is that better than life in the Kimberley. I had a cat at home waiting for me, Seven most likely knew that cats were for chasing. He had ‘friends’ and family at Mulan, I would be taking him away from them.
What happened to Seven ? In Aboriginal culture stories are often stronger than ‘fact’. One day I received word from Kevin and Andrea who had been back to visit people at Mulan and launch Kevin’s new book of poetry Look at the Lake by K. Brophy, that Seven had been taken to another community. An email from a teacher living in my duplex said Seven had been around when she first arrived, however the children said he had died. All I know is, he is alive in my heart.
Recently i’ve enjoyed seeing online updates of my cousin Melinda’s paintings. Her work reminds me to work with edges in-terms of colour value and to not just render a painting to create a 3D effect. That way of painting allows the painting to have more life about it as a complete piece. I feel almost like Im starting a new. Loving the process - building stamina for seeing what is ‘wrong’ and pushing on to find new solutions.
This painting has more to go…
