Three big stories, one big theme; Life's full of unexpected finds.

Astounded, Cole asks:
“This is yours? It’s wonderful. The gracefulness, the composition and...”

She interrupts with a smile:
“Well, if our young farm boy isn’t an artist!”

Cole lowers his eyes, gripping his wrist and says quietly:
“Was. I broke my wrist. I can’t control the pencil. I can’t draw the way I used to. It was…”

She finishes his sentence:

“It was everything to you. That’s the sublime thing about art. One gets to take moments of hardship and heartbreak, and channel them into something that makes a sad boy feel less alone at a party. Art, the ability to make it, gives meaning to sadness in a way that many aren’t able to experience.”

Her words are extraordinary. They explain the drive, the ambition, almost the obsession, behind being an artist. They remind us that art is not just about creating something beautiful; it is about pouring our emotion into form and colour, so that others can find comfort, connection, and conversation in it.

Anne enters the scene...

The lady goes on to say:
“There is no straight path in art or life. Sometimes there’s no path at all. One must break down walls and machete their way through the woods to get where they need to go.”

Anne says  "Oh, my. Have you ever heard a thing said for the first time, yet it made such magnificent sense, it's as if you'd been waiting to hear it all your life?"

To Anne, she says:
“You have a beautiful connection to words. Do something with it. Go where your passion leads you.”

And to Cole:
“Try clay, Cole the artist. It’ll strengthen your wrist and who knows, you may fall in love. Your art isn’t lost. It never will be.”

Every time I watch this, it reminds me that art has the power to connect strangers, to spark conversation, and to make us feel seen.

With the party season just around the corner (time passes by so quickly nowadays!), I thought about how special it is to have art in the home, not only as something you love and cherish, but as a focal point for gathering, sharing stories, and connecting with others. A painting can be much more than decoration; it can be the start of a meaningful conversation or relationship. You know how sometimes it can be awkward entering a room full of strangers. If discussing a piece of interesting art helps to break the ice, all the better!

The lady's words stopped me in my tracks. They explain the drive, the obsession, the need within us to create. To pour grief, love, longing, and beauty onto a canvas so that someone else, a stranger even, might stand before it and feel understood.

That’s exactly what I try to express in my paintings, for instance "She’s Gone." (Or, bearing in mind the subject of the scene, perhaps it's "He's Gone" - it's open for interpretation how ever the viewer wants to see it, as is all art.)

In 'She's Gone' a man stands at the edge of the waves, head bowed, body heavy with perhaps sorrow or, as one lady saw it, he's contemplating proposing to his lover. Or is he grieving? We don’t know. What matters is the ache we recognise in him. That quiet, wordless moment when loss feels too big to carry, yet somehow, the sea absorbs it with him.

Explore 'Surf Love (She's Gone)' and see if it speaks to you...

o O o  

Chocolate, Calm and Comfort...

And why it matters, in art.