This image was given shape by my childhood memories of Uganda. There was a large mango tree at the bottom of the garden, and my brother and I would play there. The composition combines watercolors and crayon. 

 

This piece was born out of two divergent impulses. On one hand, I wanted to portray the many happy moments in my childhood and revisit my memories of playing in the garden. On the other hand, I also recognize, through the process of creating this piece, that that moment has now passed, it cannot be revisited, it is lost to time and experience. It is a bittersweet combination of emotions. 

 

The piece is pure in its happiness because it represents a time when I was wonderfully lost in play, fully engaged in whatever I was doing. However, the piece also depicts childhood as a world in itself, a time separate from the present. Untouched by the darker shadows and responsibilities of adulthood, this moment is unsullied and idealized. It is a frozen moment, captured in the amber glow of the past. Through creating this artwork, my childhood is both lost and found. 

 

The simplicity of the form itself suggests a blissful, childlike innocence. The image is both the real tree growing in my garden and an archetypal, storybook tree. Viewed through my memories, this tree of life reaches up toward the light depicting nature as a nurturing and positive force. Nestled at the heart of the tree and connected to it is the inchocate infant. This ambiguous form represents both the endless potential to become and yet suggests that the safety of the tree must be relinquished, and innocence lost as that journey begins.