Looking for the Light
March 2020
Being an artist means that very often my first thought is where does the light come from in my painting? Where the light comes in determines where the shadows will go. On every painting, without exception, there’s always light and dark. The darker the shadow, the more depth it creates making the light shine brighter. You cannot paint a picture without this contrast of light and dark.
In the film the Lion King, you’re probably familiar with the bit where Simba asks his father Mufasa how big is the Kingdom. He gets Simba to look in the distance and tells him that everywhere the light hits is his Kingdom.
The journey of life consists of a lot of dark days and a lot of light days. Some days seem dominated by the darkness. Since going down this journey of self-discovery, the light days have overcome the dark days. But when the dark days do come, I try to reclaim the light for my life, remembering the positive things, and not focusing on the negative. (This is easier said than done!)
I have come to see that the dark has value even though I don’t like it at the time. Working through those dark times helps me grow and without I would never appreciate the good days.
