It has taken
me a long time to write this, while it took me surprisingly less time to paint
this portrait. This is, as you probably
guessed, a portrait of my dad. I had
been journaling about my memories of growing up with him, and how
our relationship had shifted as I made the transition into adulthood. While I was sitting at work one day listening
to folk music and thinking about my dad who is in fact a folk musician. Suddenly it dawned on me, my next painting needed
to be of him, not just a nice portrait, but a close up image of him with his
one eyebrow raised (a common expression of his). I could see the painting in my mind and I
started it that same day.
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My subject
matter certainly helped me with my painting, in many ways. I have found that when you feel so strongly
about an image, as I did about this one, you have to paint it. At first I was a little apprehensive about
it, what if turned out to be horrible? I hated to think about showing my father a
painting of himself and have represented him poorly. Still, it nagged at me, it had to
be painted even if it was horrible, and if it was I could always cover it with
something else as no one would ever have to see it. In my limited experience however, I have
found that when a painting nags at you like this one did, it will usually turn
out well.
As I said,
my subject matter helped me in many ways, not just the image I painted but the
man that image represents. My father,
Randy Fehler. To me my dad has never
aged a day, he still looks the same to me as he did when I was a child, even
though he's aged more than twenty years in my lifetime. When I reflect on my memories of him,
he remains the same. Some of these memories stand out in my mind
as moments that helped shape me into the person I am, even if those moments did
nothing more than make me feel loved.
As I
mentioned, my dad is a musician. While
he makes his living doing something else, his love is music. He writes music and plays a multitude of
different instruments. He used to sit in
the basement of our house to play, and I would take my homework downstairs and
listen to him. I had a few favorite
songs of his. I'll never forget the day I realized he wrote them. We were in the car when I asked him who wrote the song 'I-65', "I did" he said.
"What?" I exclaimed, "you wrote that?"
"Yes!" He said rather intently. I was amazed, and a little proud, that my dad
could do something so awesome! As I grew
up my dad was my main source of musical education. I love listening to folk and bluegrass music
just like him, at first the music reminded me of him but the more I listen
the more I love it on it's own!
My dad is much
more than musical education, he is a consistent source of love and
support. He and my mother amazed me when
I decided to shift my focus from music to art in my senior year of high
school. An art degree is not something
that really makes you a lot of money in life, but my parents never tried to
steer me to anything else, they wanted me to be happy in life, even if that
meant never having much money. It was my
dad who bought me my very first real paintbrush. Throughout my childhood I loved drawing,
painting, and making things. The crayons
and watercolor set were always my favorite part of back to school
shopping! When I was about 7 years old, my dad bought
me my first set of real artist's paintbrushes.
My sister had taken the plastic brush from my watercolor set and cut the
bristles short because they 'painted better that way.' I was devastated! I ran to my dad with the ruined brush and he
did his best to console me. Later that
week he came home with a set of three camel hair paintbrushes and presented
them to me saying that these were mine to paint with, I didn't have to
share. They couldn't have been more precious
to me if they'd been made of gold.
This was
just the first of many things my dad got for me to support my art. Over the years he brought home a number
of things from an artist's bag to a mitre saw, all things I needed to be
successful as an artist. He even hung
all my college paintings in his music room.
When I decided to buy a nice DSLR camera, I naturally went to my father
for help in choosing one. He was a talented
photographer as well as a talented musician.
His photos were hung around our house and I always marveled at
them. With his guidance I chose a
camera, saved my money and bought the thing while I was home for a visit. When I got to my parents house with my new
camera my dad and I spent some time playing with it and he gave me a crash
course in photography, at the very least I went back to Chicago knowing what all the
buttons did. He then disappeared for a
minute, when he returned he was carrying his old grey camera bag full of
equipment. He gave me two tripods, a lens
filter, and his old grey camera bag. I
love that bag, not only is it just a good bag and really cool looking, I love
it because it was my father's bag. I
find I hold my head just a little higher when I have it with me.
When I
decided to start my jewelry business, he was right there ready to help. He had been participating in the KY Music
Weekend for years, and they had recently started a craft fair section. He encouraged me to enter the fair. When I did enter, he immediately began making
preparations. I had never done a fair
like this before and needed a tent, displays, everything. My dad got me a tent, a table, constructed
two display boards and an earring display, as well as a standing display
incorporating some of his instruments to keep with the music weekend
theme. As I was travelling by bus from Chicago, I could not have made these preparations without him. At the
next year's fair he stepped up yet again when I started selling some of my photographs.
He helped not only with selecting those
that were 'sale worthy' but with printing and framing them as well. Later
my mother told me how he'd worked so hard in the weeks before the fair to get
everything ready for me. He was invaluable.
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| My dad helping me set up at the Music Weekend fair. |
As if my
father's supportive and loving actions were not enough, I have caught
supportive words from him as well. I'll
overhear him talking with someone about my work and catch him saying something
like "she's very
good." Almost like he would praise
me as any father would and then lean in and do 'real talk'. Recently he told me about his experience of
the time I brought home a painting I'd been working on in high school. I'd painted an old woman with all her
wrinkles, it was the best of my work at that time. He said to me "you brought that home and
we all went 'whoa!'" Even still,
every time I post a new design to my facebook page, he shares and comments
about how good it is. I wonder if he
knows how much his words and actions have affected me.
With all
these memories swimming in my mind I painted this portrait of my father. The experience of painting it brought me
somehow closer to him, it trudged up memories that laid untouched in my mind
for too long. Through my reminiscing I
was able to see my dad's relationship with me as a whole, and realized all the
many ways he has impacted my life. I
think I would be a very different person without him.
I kept the
painting a relative secret until it was finished. When it finally was completed all the apprehensions and nerves I had at the beginning melted away. It was everything I wanted it to be. It was ready to be revealed to my father, the
one opinion I cared most about. His
reaction was wonderful! It went
something like this: "Oh my!...Are you serious!" and then of course,
"well, even though I don't care for the subject matter, it is very well
done!" I told him how I needed to paint
it, about how everything in me screamed to make this painting, and as a fellow
artist, I knew he would understand.
I made this
painting because it needed to be painted.
I don't quite know why but the resulting increase in love, appreciation,
and admiration I have for my father is reason enough.
I wonder if
he will ever really know the impact he's had on my life, and how much I love
him.
