14 Aug The Great Beauty

THE GREAT BEAUTY

Barbara Bose

A friend snapped a blurry photo recently, while zooming on a scooter past a market in Morocco.

I wanted to paint this lady’s beautiful gesture, captured during a random, split second connection between total strangers – a tourist passing by someone going about her day shopping half way across the world, but that shared momentary instant of eye contact is now a painting.

While I painted her beautiful gesture, I wondered who this lady was? How old is she? What does the long black veil mean? Why was she wearing gloves? Was she hot? Is the blue abaya significant? Who was she shopping for? Her life is infinitely different than mine, but now a tiny speck of time shared has been enshrined on my canvas. Her beatific pose suggests a blessing – and indeed, I feel blessed as I remember the beautiful truth that actually we are all connected in time and space, wherever and whoever we are. I placed her on my bedroom wall and looked up at her as I lay in bed.

Then a terrible the earthquake happened in Morocco. I worried about her and sent her love.