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But if I could mother myself, maybe I could see myself clearly; Let go of any bitterness. Maybe I was easier to love when there was less of me. And there is quiet in the considering: You have been me before, but I would be less smothering.
I would make a life in the withdrawing, fill out the gaps and find love in the cracks of everything. Comb through the threads of each new beginning.
Nostalgia is something that I think about and experience quite regularly. It inspires and motivates my creative mind continuously and is often the driving force behind my illustrative practice. Through nostalgia we are able to fondly remember childhood and look past some of the bad years that come along with it. I think its fascinating how different forms of media can encapsulate a time period of your life. For my piece I reflect on the copious amount of time I spent playing Pokémon Pearl as a kid on my red DS, tucked away in my room and safely away from the events happening in my life. It allowed me to escape into another world where I always had company and never felt alone. Every now and then, I take out that old game cartridge to once again check on my old friends and relive our adventures together.
Recently I’ve been helplessly nostalgic over evening walks during university. There’s something so calming about the city lights on the water, the way the streets are paved in blues and yellows. The walks kept me company from a friend’s home, from a bar, to the door of my partner. The sights of these bridges and stones will always remind me of them in my nights alone.
When I was a child my mum got me some of these finger frights as she remembered playing with them during her own childhood in the 70s! I have always been drawn to more unique and unusual toys like the finger frights and still enjoy collecting toys to display in my room as an adult.
Wistfulness is a synonym for nostalgia - to be full of yearning or desire whilst feeling melancholy. Both drawings I have made are self portraits: one of me now and the other of me at six years old. I sometimes look back on my childhood wishing I could have made things different for my younger self, after having learnt how to love myself as an adult, I wonder what life might have been like if I was a little bit kinder to that little girl. But regardless, I do like looking back noticing these changes, not just my emotional growth but physical growth as well.
I based the inspiration of this illustration, from when my siblings and I were small, and my dad worked all over the world for BT. He would always need to be able to jump on a flight or train at a moments notice. And so it became a funny little routine for us all, with the long car journeys seeing the sunrise, early morning train station drop-off’s and airport dashes, sleepily bundled up in blankets and our pyjamas, before being whizzed off to school.