Grief, Art, and Why I Disappeared

Why I Disappeared (And Why I’m Back)

Let’s not pretend—I’ve been missing for a while. The blog’s been quiet. My paintings slowed to a crawl. I could say “life got busy,” but that would be dodging the truth. The real reason is grief. Grief is like someone turned the world’s color knob down to zero and then snapped it clean off.

Losing My First Art Critic

It all started in May 2022. My nanna died at 93. I always called her my roommate—I lived with her for a couple of years, watched horse racing with her, made cups of coffee, the whole thing. Five days after her funeral, my mum died. No warning. No … anything. Just gone. I stuck around in the UK for six weeks, helping my dad clear out my nanna’s house and trying to make sense of it all. (Spoiler: I didn’t.)

My mum was my first real art critic—the kind who’d look at a pile of ugly crayon scribbles and act like I’d just painted the Sistine Chapel. “Oh, that’s brilliant, that is. We’ll have to put that on the mantlepiece.” You don’t realize how much that matters until it’s gone.

Turns out, I was painting for her more than I thought.

In between sorting, sobbing, and sipping cups of tea, I sketched. A lot. I had “down time”—which is just another way of saying I had too much time to think. When I came back to the States, I had a sketchbook full of scenes, even though I wasn’t exactly itching to paint. Still, I did. One of those paintings was my last happy memory with my mum—us walking around West Park in Goole with my wife and kids.

Last walk with my mum

8 x 10 oil on canvas.
November 2022

Trying to Keep the Light On

After coming home, I built a “Little Free (Art) Library.” I left paintings out in town for strangers to grab. Free art. No catch. I figured if I couldn’t find much magic for myself, maybe someone else could use a bit.

Things were alright for a while. Sort of. But I struggled.

And Then My Dad Died

Eighteen months after my mum, my dad died too. I fucking screamed at the sky.

“Really? Both of them?”

I felt like someone pulled the plug on the sun. It could be the brightest day ever, but everything looked black.

Since then, I’ve finished maybe five paintings. My sketchbook is basically a stack of blank pages since December 2023. The longer you’re away, the heavier it gets—like stopping in the middle of a marathon and watching everyone else run by. Eventually, you start wondering if it’s even worth taking another step.

What Came Next?

But even when I didn’t want to paint, I still needed to make something. That’s when he whispered, “Hey, wanna make shit….?”

[To be continued…💀]

When the World Lost Its Color