I often miss my grandparents and infact hardly a day goes by when I don’t think about them. In this painting I have painted myself and my husband as we may look in our old age.  If you look on the paintings and photographs on the wall behind us, some of those are my version of actual paintings that we have on our walls that were painted by my talented father artist and sculptor Ted Jonsson. (The REAL paintings I have photographed and posted below for you to see:)

My grandparents on both sides of the family were the loveliest of people and I do deeply regret not spending enough time with them.  One reason for that was as I entered into the teenage years hanging out with my friends suddenly became really important and then the other that we immigrated to Australia and distance kept us apart.  Unfortunately by the time I had started to model and earned some serious money to go over and see them they had all already died.  If you fancy a read about our recent trip to Sweden here is a travel and art blog 167. THE ART OF LETTING GO

THE ART OF NO REGRETS

So these regrets I have inside is something I didn’t want my own children to be burdened with and therefore spending time with their grandparents is something I have always prioritized for them.  I found a lovely article on the subject in the Saturday supplement to the Advertiser by Mark Dapin which I would like to share with you here;

Here’s to you, Jimmy (by Mark Dapin, from SAWeekend)

“I had a drink with my grandad last week, although he’s been dead for 24 years. It was a ritual I used to observe, a pledge I’d always planned to keep: every time I found myself alone in the bar, I’d toast Jimmy. I’d think of him, and share my thoughts with him, as if he were there. Because, in life, Jimmy was always in a bar, raising his beer glass to clink with another, or lowering his whisky glass under the table to take a surreptitious refill from his hip flask.

He died the week I left England, so I couldn’t go to his funeral. For many years, asleep in my bed in Australia, I dreamed he’d ask me to go for a beer. I’d tell him I couldn’t, because he was dead. He’d say it was all a mistake, and we’d set out for the pub, happy and relieved. And then I’d wake up believing it was true, that I was still young and my grandad hadn’t died.

One night, the dreams ended, and Jimmy never came again, although occasionally in my sleep I’d find myself in the warm, dark living room of his tiny terrace house, with Jimmy asleep on his armchair and my nan perched fretfully on the lounge.

We probably stopped having our first beers together when I had children. Then I got my first iPhone, and gave up the few small spaces in my life I used to fill with memory and contemplation. I texted the living rather than drinking with the dead.

Jimmy took me for my first drink at a pub called the Mansion in the middle of a park, and I brought him his last, in a hospice as he lay dying. We had a couple in between, but too few, far too few.

There were so many things I didn’t ask him, so many answers I thought I’d never know. But as I’ve grown older, I’ve grown into him, and now I realise what his life must’ve been like, and there’re many things between us that can go unsaid.

Which is just as well, since he’s dead.

But last week I was sitting alone in a country pub, a snug steakhouse bar with a log fire, and I was about to message a friend when I remembered Jimmy, and I sipped my beer and gave him the time of night. I thought about the tickle of his whiskers as he rubbed them against my cheek when I was little, and the smell of alcohol on his breath and on his skin.

When my meal arrived, I remembered his favourite dinner (he called it “tea”) was steak and chips, and the way he’d mop up my nan’s gravy with soft slices of white bread. I could see the bubbles of fat in the gravy, taste the salt in the juice. He liked HP Sauce on his chips, and it’d been years since I’d thought of that.

I tried to build a picture from there, to recall all I could about the house where they’d lived: the odd things they’d kept in their cupboards, the treasures they’d stored in their drawers. I thought of their dictionary with its section of maps and I wished I had kept it so I could look at it again.

I have so little of my grandparents: a handful of photographs, and a sprinkling of memories which fade, in truth, into memories of memories, until they become just stories I have told or been told.

They lived through the Depression, the war, the blitz, rationing, austerity and the end of Empire.

Jimmy saw children’s bodies smashed into kindling and crushed among the bricks of bombed out homes. So by the time he had grandchildren, I think he understood how fragile and temporary we were.

Across the bar in the pub I saw a boy eating out with his grandparents. I watched him ignore them as he played games on his iPad. I wanted to tell him to look up from the screen, and make himself some memories. Because one day he would need them more than he could ever guess.”

An article well worth reading I thought and even though it is something we try to keep in mind I still made the whole family read it!

Here is a quote I think fits well here by Alex Haley;

“Nobody can do for little children what grandparents do.  Grandparents sort of sprinkle stardust over the lives of little children.”

Till next time happy painting, sculpting and also spending lots of time with your own loved ones.

Love Marie xxx

Why not come and have a look at Marie Jonsson-Harrison’s PAINTINGS FOR SALE, GICLEE PRINTS FOR SALE and SCULPTURES for sale or WALLBASED SCULPTURES.  Enjoy an original artwork on your walls or perhaps one on your bed ARTnBED.

This painting “Christmas for the Elders family” was commissioned by Jim Elders from the Elders Fine Art Gallery in Adelaide, South Australia, a man I much admire and without whom I would not be enjoying this wonderful career as an Artist.

I have told you how I started painting in How it all began, which is something that I did every minute of the day (in-between looking after a new baby & going back to modelling) early morning, late into the evening, when baby Kai had his naps, and all weekend when hubby took over the child minding.

PAINTING OBSESSED

Friends and family was highly amused at my newfound love of painting and would come over to see the latest artwork.   They would giggle and laugh and I am sure in a lot of instances pat me on the head, shake their heads and think that at least I am amusing myself but it won’t amount to anything much, LOL.

JUNK ART SCULPTOR

Not that I thought it would either I just knew that I could not stop and if I wasn’t painting I thought about painting, dreamt about it or talked about it, like a woman obsessed.  My dad, who is an artist himself but generally more in the abstract area or as a junk art sculptor, would encourage me and buy me paints and materials.  After a while he said:” you know honey I think you are on to something – there is a genre in the art world called Naive Art and although it does not look anything like yours it seems to be in the same vein.”  So dad got me a few books and I started to dream that maybe one day I could become a “real artist”.

It took about 2 years for this penny to drop and I thought I should see if I could get representation from a gallery.  Now obviously as my father was already an artist with gallery backing and I had quite a public profile from being the Australian Model of the Year it probably would have been much easier to take advantage of that but I wanted to make it on my own arts merit.

CALLING ART GALLERIES

So armed with the Yellow Pages (Telephone Directory) I started calling galleries.  I started with the less known and worked my way up the list.  In the most polite of fashions I explained that I was a new artist and was wondering if at some stage I could either come in or send them an image of my work.  Without fail every single gallery I called said: “sorry we are not interested in seeing any new artists, or we are totally booked out”, and some of them were rather rude and abrupt.  At this stage there were only 2 Galleries left in South Australia (that I hadn’t called) and that was the two most famous ones 20 years ago;  BMG (Kim Bonython’s) and Elders Fine Art Gallery, and as luck would have it I called Elders first.

Jim Elder answered the phone himself and I couldn’t believe it when he said; “sure come on in!  I will warn you however that I very rarely take on any new artists but I always look”, and with that we made an appointment.

ART GALLERY APPOINTMENT

So on the allotted day I turn up, Jim is very busy getting a show up and hardly acknowledges me but points at where I should put my work along the walls on the floor.  I had 14 works with me so it took quite a while back and forth from the car and finally it’s all in and eventually Jim comes to take a look.

His face gave nothing away, he looked grumpy to me and sort of huffed and asked what the price on this and that one is?  I said that I had no idea at all what the prices were, so Jim said, well that painting I think would be 300 dollars, and this one 500 and the artwork with the flowers 950.  By this stage my eyes were round as saucers as I listen to this obviously quite mad man, lol.  But who was I to argue and when he then said he would buy, this one and that one and the other outright, counting up 10 of the artworks and taking in the other 4 on commission basis I nearly fainted.  I left Elders Fine Art Gallery that day with a cheque for nearly 7 thousand dollars, which with a young family and a mortgage made me skip to the car!

The paintings sold the following weekend in their Christmas show and I now had a new career painting full time and the rest of it is history as they say!

So thank you Jim and Helen Elders, you provided the most wonderful start to my career and I am forever in your debt.  It goes without saying, that if the Elders had not changed the gallery to an Auction house: Elders Fine Art & Auctioneers, I would still happily be on their books.

So here is a quote by George Allen,  I think fits very well in here with light of what everyone thought initially about my art career, lol.

“People of mediocre ability sometimes achieve outstanding success because they don’t know when to quit.  Most men succeed because they are determined to.”

Till next time happy painting and sculpting to you all,

Love Marie xxx  (c)

Why not come and have a look at Marie Jonsson-Harrison’s PAINTINGS FOR SALE, GICLEE PRINTS FOR SALE and SCULPTURES for sale or WALLBASED SCULPTURES.  Enjoy an original artwork on your walls or perhaps one on your bed ARTnBED.

This painting “Antonis Tivoli” is one I painted for my father SCULPTOR Ted Jonsson and depicts him and his family, my grandparents.  They spent nearly all their lives travelling around Sweden and nearby countries with their side shows and entertainments which also had a dance venue with a live band.

CIRCUS LIFE

They usually travelled for 6 months during the warmer weather then came back to Stockholm where they spent the winter months doing repairs on the sideshows trucks and tents.

They had 5 children, 4 of whom joined the Tivoli, however my Dad was the youngest and he had to stay at home and go to school.  He would live in their large 2 story home all by himself from the age of around 10, for six months at a time.

PAINTING IDEAS

My father describes this time as very scary and also very exciting as he got older.  His parents would leave him bags and bags full of coins (small change from the Tivoli) to use for food and whatever he needed. They also arranged for the local deli owner to give him credit.

Can you imagine nowadays leaving a child of 10 alone for half a year, however in those days things were different and when my grandparents were home they were great parents from what I can understand.

My dad would come home and check the whole house for ghosts and burglars with a large knife in his hand, walking from room to room.  His nutritional value count could well have been low lol, as he remembers eating a lot of cornflakes during those months.

My grandfather Anton joined the circus at the age of 16, working as an acrobat artist and did a high-wire act.  My grandmother Vera ran away from home at 15 (as I did when I was 14 but that’s another story) and she went out to sea, joined on as a kitchen hand.  They eventually met and ran away to join the circus, well made a circus in their case!

On this painting my grandmother is tied to a spinning wheel although that may be my artistic licence, what is true however is that she was blind folded and tied up and my grandfather also blind folded, would throw knives around her.  My father describes their marriage as a good one but very volatile and remembers many a time when they would have big fights just as their music would start up and their names were announced to go on stage.  He remembers holding his breath hoping that his mother would not get hurt.  She herself had no such qualms however knowing and trusting that Anton would keep her safe, such faith!!    (to be continued)

So I am very glad this next quote was said by Thomas Hart Benton (politician) and not my grandfather!

“I never quarrel, sir.  But sometimes fight, sir, and whenever I fight, sir, a funeral follows”

Hope you come back and visit me again, till then happy painting and sculpting everyone!

Love Marie xx   (c)

The continuation of this art blog here 21. Life in a Circus Tent

Why not come and have a look at Marie Jonsson-Harrison’s PAINTINGS FOR SALE, GICLEE PRINTS FOR SALEand SCULPTURES for sale or WALLBASED SCULPTURES.  Enjoy an original artwork on your walls or perhaps one on your bed ARTnBED.