She Waits

Several weeks ago I set out to create a piece for the Uniquely Fredericksburg show. I thought I was going to do a horizontal piece with three of these windows. However, the piece had other plans.

I laid down several layers of background paint, and when I looked at the picture vertically, I could see the form of a woman, so I decided to use water-soluble pastels to sketch in her head and neck. Once I got that in, I could see there would only be room for one window, with a lot of blank space at the bottom. I decided that the woman was waiting for her husband to come home from war. I sifted through some old family letters and came across one that told of a father dying in a civil war hospital. It said that he was buried a few weeks before the family knew he had died.

The next day, I went to the Confederate Cemetery on Amelia Street to take some photos. Then, for the next three nights, I pushed and pulled and struggled with the piece. I kept telling myself that I didn't need to make this deadline; there would be other shows.

I put a man inside the window, and realized it wasn't working for me. The panes in the window cut his face up in a strange way. Plus, the man was gone... he wouldn't be looking out the window. The family would be looking for him. I quit working on the piece.

Two days later, at an estate sale,  I found  a photo of a girl. On a whim, I put her behind the window, and
she fit perfectly. By this time it was the night before the deadline.

While I was rummaging in my studio for a tool, I found a second photo. The woman in the photo looked to me like the woman I had painted. The piece was completed and I hadn't missed the deadline. I got up early the next morning to hammer the frame pieces onto the finished piece.

Tonight, at the Uniquely Fredericksburg Show, She Waits won a second place ribbon in the mixed media category.