Happy Birthday Simone

Dear Simone, 

Reading your The Bear in The Mirror  for the second time

                                          do not exist. 

They need words to exist, people and places and pages, of course. But in that case, are they life or art? Let’s be ambiguous; for your birthday I send you again art from my family, by grandfather Oreste. I come from that garden, around it were fields and mountains beyond the lake, in Switzerland.

Grandfather painted me near the petunias. As I am made of time, strange intangible word, I moved out and far. Also, I never left the garden. These paintings keep me anchored. 

Stories are told to my eyes by the light sweeping the small scene, almost burning the mountains’ tops during the sunset, and by each stroke of color. The act of painting for grandfather, and for me so very often making drawings next to him, were living moments grabbing an image from the passing time. To make an image out of love. Fighting, holding the power of changing not, and forever being. A strong circle connects me to these images as if my life could go back and forth jumping beyond obstacles. 

I wish I could walk out of the painting and give you a petunia for your birthday.

Is white ok?   

With love, Rosanna

Two paintings by Oreste Albertini, 1947 for the garden and unknown date for the landscape.