By deevaa Date: 31 January 2001
Just another heart
14" x 15" (38.5cm x 35cm)
Mixed media on canvas
by deevaa
I like to paint hearts. I guess I'm just a hopeless romantic.
The very first heart I painted was for my lover on for valentines day in 1996.
We were getting married in March that year, and had very little money -- he didn't have a work permit and I was working in a low paid job. So we made an agreement that we'd could spend $15 each on our gifts.
I had always enjoyed painting, but didn't start taking it seriously until 2000 -- back then I'd make birthday cards for my friends, nothing more than flights of whimsy.
The weekend before valentines day I pulled out my paint box and created. This was the very first time I felt like my brush was leading me, creating for me, I didn't decided what to paint, or which colours to use -- it just happened, the painting just worked.
My $15 was spent on a clip on glass frame. [his heart]
Ade brought half a dozen, red miniature roses. They cost him the full $15.
He smuggled them into the house the night before valentines day and hid them in a cupboard by the bed, they were badly wilted and a little worse for wear when he gave them to me.
But thats not the reason why I remember that valentines day --
He'd used up his $15 and was worried that he'd not got me a card, so he made one.
Sneaking into my art supplies he painted a piece of card gold, he cut out pictures and words from magazines and spelt out 'I love you' in ransom note styled letters, he'd cut my face out of a photo and glued it amongst a bunch of flowers he'd trimmed from cosmo, and he'd wrote about how much he loved me. He'd done something uncharacteristically romantic and incredibly thoughtful.
I still have that card.