A HAPPY BERRY

I loved the lecture this week. There’s nothing like a spot of relevant material to apply to upcoming projects (something I feel I’ve never actually experienced, which is probably my own fault and maybe I should just pay more attention). I’ve been thinking about two options for the upcoming portrait project, who to choose and how to approach it. My first ideas were pretty bad and although I won’t mention what they were, I’d like to mention I did have them as that is part of the development and refinement in the design process. I then came up with my grandfather, who seems really obvious, as an older, wiser gentleman with a fantastic story and multitudes of life experience. Although the challenge in covering my grandfather, or Pa as we endearingly call him, is that he passed away in 2010 when I was 16. I feel like this presents an opportunity to tell a story as the people around him saw it, how he touched their lives and left his beautiful legacy. His development as a character could be reflected through the years he lived, and I could interview his sister, about his younger years, all the way down to my youngest cousin who could share fond memories of Pa. While it serves as a tribute to his life and a keepsake for my extended family (no pressure on myself at all if I commit…) I could learn a lot in interviewing close relatives, looking to evoke emotion and personal moments, which could add to a quite compelling narrative. There is only one video of Pa that my mum knows about, when he is riding off into a paddock on Beau, his last horse. I can already see that being the climax of what would be a narrated story, adding a genuine element of his existence in the closing moments of the video. So yeah good lecture. Food for thought.