Have you ever woken on a train at the end of the line, disorientated and not quite knowing what to do next? A period of confusion before realising you are at your destination and need to get off. Being told you have cancer brings the same sense of disorientation and inner confusion as you struggle to come to terms with the news. Consultants vary in their approach. Some are criticised for their lack of empathy, refusing to look the sufferer in the eye when delivering the news. I was lucky. If anything my team were over friendly, eager to assist, to reassure and the enable me to come to terms with the event.
For me it was doubly scary as both my mum and dad died of cancer, neither dying easy. I had these precedents in mind, but also had my partner holding my hand. Not for the first time she was there for me, having helped me defeat type 2 diabetes (as I described in ‘Old Town, New War’). Pamela the gentle and compassionate head nurse also reassured, and with the rest of the consultant team held out hope of a positive outcome.
The used materials that go into making the painting only tell a part of the story
Treatments have moved on since my father’s death in the 1990’s, and the bladder cancer I had developed was also caught early. The disease was caused in all probability by working in the screen printing studios in Art College, where the solvents of the day were known carcinogens. I was young and arrogant with it, working without protection as, like the young, I thought I was invulnerable. The disease can take 30 – 40 years to develop, and was caught in my case because of a bleed I developed in Cyprus when writing for HotelDesigns. The investigation showed cancer in my bladder, looking on the screens like cobwebs.
The treatment involved infecting my bladder with live tuberculosis vaccine, reaction to which seemingly expelled the cancer with the bacillus. It means at each treatment I am infectious for a little while, and it can leave me feeling quite ill as my body fights the two diseases. The success rate for this treatment is a staggering 80%, good news for me. It was during one of these bouts of weakness that I sat in the sun amongst the honeysuckle in the back garden, giving rise to this latest painting.
Just over halfway through making the painting there was a 3 week hiatus as I went on a healing trip into Europe
A number of drawings and now a large (4 foot square) painting have been produced from the honeysuckle imagery. In the drawings I focussed on the relationship between image and colour, but predominantly the colour. I traced this through the blog piece Honeysuckle Fun and traced the gestation back to Honeysuckle Sun in June, sitting in the sun.
I feel I have been in a dark tunnel and painting has been one of the few lights to pull me out the other end. Being told you have cancer is a blow. It is not the death sentence it was for my father but it is still damn scary. As is the treatment.
Honeysuckle
So the approach to the painting was both too tentative and too impatient, both driven by a fear of not being around long enough to finish it. Now I am ‘cured’, I can be more relaxed. I want to revisit the drawing, not the colour, but the line drawings which were really unresolved, and the drawing of the canvas, which works in part. I feel optimistic and am looking forward to life and eagerly enjoying the studio now.
I learned long ago that the images need to be strong if they are really to work in the paintings and here I didn’t quite work it out enough to be totally happy with the end result. So I intend now to produce perhaps a series of somewhat smaller paintings using the imagery but treating it in a different way. I am going back to the thinking that was behind the ‘T4Two’ painting, which in many ways I think was the most successful piece I produced.
Tea for Two Acrylic on Canvas 4 feet 6 inches square 1998. Now in a Private Collection in London
So two creative streams running in parallel. Plus long walks on the shore with the camera. Life is full, and despite continuing cancer treatments and the uncertainties that come with them, I look forward to many more years of fun.
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For answers to questions on Cancer go to Macmillan, whose support I gratefully received
I send you my love Patrick. I always read all your tweets and news on hotel designs.
Stay strong, stay artist!
Thank you. Unfotunately I could not continue with hotel design but I stillwrite at staging.hospitable-van.flywheelsites.com, mainly about art but some about design and travel. Always available for consultancy too, if you ever need help on an hotel project. Thanks again for your best wishes
Glad to find up and running again Patrick. I know Seaford well and have relatives there. Great place for your neccessary R&R. Love the art and many years ago I won some prizes at it myself so I look forward to picking up the brushes again soon. You are an inspiration pal keep up the good work. See you in Town soon.Were you at St Martins? – we arer the owner of that old site now.
I was a course advisor to St M’s many years ago, helped structure one of their programmes. Great site, locqation location location! Had a show in the Crypt Gallery in Seaford, still actively writing as you’ll see on Patrickgoff.com – freelance commissions on hotels accepted! You can follow my day to day inthe studio at https://www.facebook.com/Patrick-Goff-733331670111069/?pnref=story
Hi Patrick,
So glad to hear that you are now in a good place and look forward to seeing your new work. All these pieces are excellent as they are.
Kind Regards
Paul
Thanks Paul. Feeling good, and quite pleased with how work is developing in the studio. I post almost daily on my Facebook art page https://www.facebook.com/Patrick-Goff-733331670111069/
Lovely to see the flower images which are reminiscent of the mural at Morley that I pass many times a day. So pleased to have made contact with you at last Patrick and you have filled in so many details about The Tree of Life which are just not recorded anywhere.
I actually like the finished painting. I like the airy feeling of the top part and the strength of the bottom part. I also see a bridge in that part (bit like Monet’s over the lily Pond). It seems to me you have married both parts very well.
Hope the treatments continue to go well.
A true hero you are Patrick!
Not a hero Guido, just a survivor
Thank God you have beaten it. This challenges us all to prepare for the next world which is far better than this temporary one and it never ends.
Love your paintings. Keep enjoying it.
Really glad the treatments are going well and the old enthusiasm is returning.
I just love the finished painting (Honeysuckle) … I really envy whoever is destined to own it.
I hope you’re pleased with it.
Take care.
Thanks HJ, Ellen wants it for her living room wall….
So pleased you’ve beaten it Patrick! Your paintings are stunning, keep up the great work.
Thanks Nicky