Les papillons fantômes et les vieilles sorcières

When my 96 year old Mother was near the end of her life, I sat by her bedside and held her hand. I remember being very transfixed at how thin her skin was, parchment like. I could see all of her veins, her tendons, her bones - I felt as if I could see to the very essence of her. Her hands seemed to glow almost as if her spirit was shining through. I thought my Mom had never looked so beautiful. I did a portrait of her from memory and then I started to work with the aging female body as the primary subject matter for my figurative work. ' ghost moths and the crones' is part of a series on older women called Allegory and Grace. In it, an aging of female lovers become one with each other and the natural world in which they exist.