Gallery
Original paintings by hand, in textured acrylic.
Forget Me Not: The Orion Nebula
A mum gazes up at the star-studded sky, then down at her three little sons. She confesses her love.
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The stars we see in the sky are memories of the universe reaching us millions of light-years later. That star over there may have burned out and no longer shine as it once did, but the universe still tells its story of radiance for billions of humans to witness.
The sky is the story of love. The stars are a reminder of purpose in creation. A ball of gas burning into oblivion, without any purpose or will of its own, is still remembered by the universe millions of years later. What of you and me? How can you not matter?
She points to the sky and says, “See those three stars in a line? That is Orion’s Belt.” The eldest says, “Hey, Mum, they’re like three brothers, just like us.” “Mama, can you draw us a picture of the Orion constellation?” How can she refuse them? She splashes black onto a canvas and then gets started with bursts of light. Six years later, she finishes the painting.
The roses that came 20 years later
“Just give me roses; I’ll show you how I preserve them.”
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Roses are what I want, not chains of gold that bind my wrist and neck: roses nursed in the bosom of Mother Earth and kissed by the morning dew, that bloom with such grace and sweet scent that they pull out a primordial memory of eternal beauty. So what if the rose will wither? It has lived to serve its purpose, to remind the soul of its true essence. Remember Him.
She preserved them in a vase on the family dining table, next to the teapot they sipped tea from after the kids went to bed, behind the box of potpourri made from the jasmine and lavender of their backyard: the smell of home. And after the roses shrivelled up, she painted them on a canvas.
Paper planes are the stuff of dreams
Three little boys made sixty paper planes in one day. The last one they aimed high, over the backyard fence.
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“What’s on the other side?” they wonder. We could find out on a map, but where is the fun in that? “Let’s just wonder,” mum said. Maybe there is a meadow full of wildflowers. Maybe a dam as still as a mirror, reflecting the juniper trees of the neighbourhood.
They aim the paper plane high. They will it to fly high, pierce the sky and soar above the clouds. And they dream. Paper planes are dream machines produced in the backyard.
Paper planes: over the meadow
Maybe there is a meadow full of wildflowers on the other side.
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Paper planes: above the clouds
They will it to fly high, pierce the sky and soar above the clouds.
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St George Basin, Sanctuary Point
An old unfinished painting of the Australian bush, taken out again during a break from the nebulas.
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Kentlyn Basin, Sydney
Still water, gum trees and the light of a Sydney afternoon.
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The Frequented House
Allah ﷻ mentions al-Bayt al-Ma‘mur, the Frequented House, in the Qur’an: “And by the Frequented House” (Surah At-Tur, 52:4).
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Angels circle a celestial Ka‘bah in the heavens, directly above the Ka‘bah in Makkah around which the pilgrims make tawaf, while the clock that sets the pace of our life runs counter to this motion. And herein lies the meeting of the soul and the body.