art | WHO REMAINS

Who Remains began as a series of charcoal drawings of my husband, Piergiorgio, as his dementia from LBD (Lewy Bodies Dementia) dramatically progressed. These first portraits of Piergiorgio reflect my effort to understand his inner world as his speech became more and more garbled, and ultimately incomprehensible. For years I had witnessed his changing physiognomy and experienced his increasingly disturbing behavior with no keys for comprehension. Drawing enabled me to approach his illness with love and curiosity instead of fear and anger. In the years that followed, our relationship changed—it became nonverbal, symbiotic, telepathic and empathic, and at times barbaric and utterly desperate. Aspects of myself emerged that horrify me still. But remarkably, in the last year of Piergiorgio’s life, his consciousness seemed to expand as his brain function deteriorated and bodily systems shut down. In his final weeks, an extraordinary awareness became evident in him, facilitated by a group of Tonglen experts in death and dying. After his death, my work changed from charcoal drawings to pastels, then oil paintings and writings, allowing me the means to fully explore my own experiences and perceptions of a loved one’s transition from this world into another.