I'm absolutely terrible at expressing sympathy beyond the conventional expressions ("I'm so sorry for your loss") but...art is a bit easier: I made this mixed media item for someone coping with a difficult loss in their family:

In progress. scrap papers, newsprint, tissue paper, decals

Because the recipient is christian, I included what I felt was an appropriate biblical verse, Ecclesiastes 3:19–22; it is, however, pretty much how atheists see things^[1] which is probably one reason I wrote it backwards (i.e. mirror writing).

You'll note I couldn't help googling the newspaper poem (which btw the recipient gave me...), discovering that the clipping was a common variant on the original, which I document, including the original author's name, Clare Harner.

old newspaper clipping, old book pages, starred tissue paper, punched papers, glue, technical pens; 2023

(I really don't like it when people don't get proper credit for their work; mebbe the clipping is so old that looking up the original might be really difficult to find, but c'mon, it was printed in a newspaper —aren't they supposed to do fact checking?) That said, I'm not certain but that the earlier version of the art isn't more successful. (IOW, the final version may be more honest, but I pushed it too hard, and it's overworked—both visually and semantically. Ah, well.)

“outside” of card: commercial scrapbooking components, angel sketch, japanese calligraphy practise; may 2023

But at the time, very nearly the last of my aunts was in the process of dying, which I presume had an impact on my creative process.

Unless otherwise noted, text, image and objects depicted therein copyright 1996--present sylvus tarn.