#37 – Plus jamais ca
January 2016
Acrylic on canvas (1m x 1m)
This particular painting has had a deeply healing impact on me.
Painting „Plus jamais ça“ („Never again“) brought up a lot of pain to the surface which I had tried to keep buried inside of me for a long time. After painting my previous painting „Souffrance“ (Suffering), I was able to access my very intimate pain – and rage – more deeply.
The first layer of this painting was very light and carefree, almost like a garden of Eden, a jungle with birds of paradise, yellows, blues, oranges and reds illuminating the canvas until a wave of pain took over my heart.
I grabbed a very dark olive green and a painter‘s knife and started to move the paint in swift motions on the canvas. The more I did, the more the pain came to the surface and I ended up cursing the boys and men who had hurt me throughout my childhood and teenage years, from bullying to sexual abuse. I finally let the tears flow which I had had to swallow because I had thought that I should not show them, being treated as a „softie“ or a „baby“ for being „too sensitive“. The rage that came up was so strong: „F**k you all, despicable abusers and perpetrators! Never again will this happen! Never again will I let this happen to me. Never again will I shut up to let anybody harm me. Never again will I be a victim. Never again will I tolerate that a girl or a woman be abused.“ Little did I know that there would be a whole campaign on social media a few months later using the hashtag #metoo to condemn this kind of abuse.
#37 – Detail 3
Etching by knife
Under my rage was a deep pain which I needed to feel and that I was able to let go on the canvas. My painter‘s knife was like a weapon for me. On the canvas, I let out all the rage and pain that I was feeling to free myself of it and let room for something new in my life. This was a very cathartic moment. I scraped the canvas, I made these deep marks in the paint, held the scraper like a knife and felt my determination not to be hurt again. I put all my rage towards abusers in those deep lines. A grid pattern emerged on the canvas and, barely visible behind it, the sensation of freedom and lightness of the previous layer. A liberating sensation.
Stepping back and looking at the marks on the painting, what came to me was the verse from the poet Rumi „The wound is the place where the light enters you“ and also Leonard Cohen‘s lyrics from his song Anthem „Forget your perfect offering There is a crack, a crack in everything That‘s how the Light gets in“.
#37 – Detail 2
Depth and transparency
Martin, the man who has accepted me wholly in his life, with all my wounds and traumas from the past, and whom I married this year, became particularly fond of this painting and welcomed it on the walls of our living room, helping me to accept my vulnerability and the full range of emotions in my life. So, indeed „Plus jamais ca“ has become a strong symbol of inner transformation. Allowing creativity in my life has truly helped me to heal some very deep wounds. And it continues to do so.