Serendipity and a Very Happy Art Tale

There are times when life seems to just go your way. When chance magically eventuates to bring you a wonderful outcome. This is the story of one of those times.

 

I love art. I don’t have a lot, other than my grandmother’s paintings, because I can’t really afford it and I don’t always see things I like. I was talking with my friend Kellie on Twitter about buying a piece of art she’d seen out at lunch, and I told her something along the lines of  ‘You NEED to buy it if you can, because if you really love it you will always remember it and always be sad it isn’t with you.”  *spoiler – she’d already got the painting by the time I commented. That’s not the serendipitous bit*.

 

The reason I was so vehement about this is because I remember so vividly two pieces of art in particular that I loved and didn’t buy.

 

The first was so long ago that I was at University and still living with my parents. A young man came to the door selling works of art that he and other students at the the Fine Arts school had produced. The work of art that I loved so much was not one of his but had been done by one of his classmates. It was a riot of oranges and reds and a big Expressionist swirl of people dancing. I fell for it. I stared at it for ages. But I didn’t have the $190 that it cost. I might have been able to scrape it together but it was a luxury and there were more pressing needs.  But I’ve always regretted it. I’ve never forgotten it. *spoiler – I never saw it again. That’s not the serendipitous bit*.

 

The other particular piece was quite different. It was a print of Supergirl over a Taranaki landscape, with the mountain in the background. She was raising herself off the ground, a look of focus and determination on her face. It spoke to me. I can’t explain exactly why, I’ve always loved superheroes but Wonder Woman was always my jam. I think it was because it spoke to where I was in my life at that time. I was a couple months in to a separation, the end of my marriage. I had gone out to lunch with a friend and we’d decided to pop into a small gallery in Ponsonby. The same friend had given me phoenix earrings cut out of wood, to remind me that although I might feel like I was in the ashes, and everything had burned down, I would rise. This artwork made me feel like that too. Like she had been knocked down but still she would rise. I stared at it. But I didn’t have the money. I left it in the gallery. I thought about it for days afterwards. Finally I decided that I had to have it. I girded my wallet and headed back to the gallery. *spoiler – it had gone. But this is leading up to the serendipitous bit*

 

I told my friend on Twitter these two stories. She decided to try and track the second one down for me. I was all  ‘Awesome, cool, thanks’.

 

But she actually did…

 

She messaged me with a photo of the work and said ‘is this it?”  I was all

 

BUT – it gets better. Turned out that the artist of the work in question is Graham Kirk. He happens to be the uncle of one of our other Twitter friends! (because New Zealand is actually that small).  I told Steph how much I loved her uncle’s work and she said she’d ask and see if he had any small prints of it left. I was so thrilled! Then she messaged me for my address and said that her uncle had sent her a couple of prints for me, that he loved how we had randomly connected the dots on twitter, and that he was stoked that his art had made me happy.  And then I was all

 

The gif might be flippant, but I actually cried a little. Sometimes when you go through really tough times it can feel as if things are never going to go your way. And when they do, when people go out of their way to do kind and wonderful things for you, that’s quite an overwhelming feeling.

 

The prints arrived today and I love them. They aren’t the one I saw so long ago, but that’s okay (more than okay) because although I’ll always love that one, I’m in a different place now. I’m a different person. The two Graham so kindly sent me are of Supergirl and Wonderwoman flying. They aren’t being held down. They aren’t struggling to rise. They are free, and brave, and strong.  THAT’s the place I’m in now.

 

I hope you enjoyed my serendipitous happy art tale 🙂

This is a link to Graham Kirk’s work, the one the page opens on is the piece I saw so long ago that I loved so much.

And this link is an article on his work touring the USA and the piece in the background of the photo of him, with Wonder Woman, is one of the two pieces he sent me via my friend.

 

What are some serendipitous moments you’ve had that have left you feeling super happy with the world? Let me know in the comments 🙂