In the heart of the winter, during a horrendously ferocious blizzard, I suited myself up and trudged out into the storm. It took me forever to get out and across the road to Tisbury Meadows where there is a beautiful tree I love photographing. The wind was howling and relentlessly brutal. There were drifts that reached mid thigh. Despite being freezing cold and wet, I shoot an entire roll of film, which is a lot for me. When I got home, I immediacy developed the film but I didn’t roll it right and it came off the reel in processing. Every single frame had gouges out of the film except this one. The minute I started printing I thought “how bazaar! She (She just seems feminine to me) looks SO calm despite this blizzard; so delicate and stately and serene in spite of this a howling and gusting storm as if to say: ‘That’s fine, do anything you want, be anything you want. I’m here.’” She’s so beautiful. If I had to sum up this tree in this picture I’d say: delicate & proud. Nothing ever fazes her. She deeply rooted.

The story behind this photograph for me was one of a deeply rooted tree withstanding the seasons, a witness to the change, and how quiet it all is. At first I felt a sensation of cold and quiet isolation in the photograph. Then the idea of children racing to the tree came into my mind. What came next was the idea of losing my mother. That just seemed to go hand in hand with the feeling of solitude.

In the song I felt memories of being homesick for a time and the desire to capture it again. The song recalled for me looking back through an album of photos. We think we remember an event when we were young, but often we are really remembering a photo. Or the photo becomes a touchstone to that memory and as time passes all that remains is that one image in our mind. In the song, I imagined a woman looking at a photograph of her mother and herself from childhood. She wants to be both that child again with her mother, and also to embrace her role as mother. She is processing the shifting roles we play in the lives of the people we love. She is cognizant that one day it will be her own children looking back at an old photo remembering her. The line ‘the world keeps moving faster, but time just slips away…’ informed the image in my head. I tend not to use too much facial detail in my paintings because I want the viewer to place their own experiences and memory into the piece.

This painting felt bittersweet and a little melancholy. Although there is no facial expression in the image I got the feeling this was a mother and daughter somewhere down south waiting with trepidation for someone to go off to war or to return from war in an unknown state of wellness. The mother and daughter would have lemonade and sugar cookies on their back porch I thought. I chose rhubarb to represented the tension I felt in not knowing the mother and daughter’s emotional context. First hit of rhubarb is bitter but then there is a wave of sweet. I felt the melancholy of the image. There is melancholy in rhubarb.

Recipe

• 8 cups chopped rhubarb (I think about 8 average sized stalks)
• 3 cups sugar
• 3 cups water
• zest of 3 lemons
• 3 cups lemon juice
• water- about 15 cups

Step 1: combine rhubarb, sugar, lemon zest and water in a saucepan. Bring to a boil and then lower heat to a simmer, stirring occasionally until the sugar is melted and the rhubarb is soft.

Step 2: Strain the mixture over a sieve or put it through a food mill or you could put it in a vitamix(though this may lake it slightly cloudy?) Let mixture completely cool.

Step 3: add lemon juice. Store in fridge tightly sealed until ready to use. You should have about 5 cups.

Step 4: use 3 parts water to 1 cup rhubarb-lemon simple syrup.

Notes:

• If you want it more lemony, add some more lemon juice to taste at the end.
• Though I have never tried this, I believe the simple syrup mixture can be frozen for several months.
• The simple syrup will keep in the fridge for about 1 month.

As I was drinking The Rhubarb Lemonade, I tried to imagine what piece of art the chef was interpreting to choose those flavors.  I imagined a love story that was too sweet to be true. I have not been eating sugar for a long time, so the taste of sugar really shocked my system.  It tasted good, but it was a guilty pleasure.  It was thick and I kept thinking about optimism and the color pink.  And lemon. I chose visuals that would elicit in others’ taste buds the same sensations I was feeling.  There is a psychedelic rhubarb kaleidoscope in there.  That’s because the rhubarb went all disco with that sugar and lemon.  My interpretation was heavily influenced by my relationship with sugar.  At the end “I” am lying on a rock covered in sugar and the Buddha is waiting for me to regain consciousness.