The tie that binds (2018), Kafka in the Rye (2018),
At once, the world began to tear apart; each surface contorting into separate shards and dispersing gracefully across my sight. I looked down at my hands with a strange sort of fascination. No longer were they a concoction of splotches of tender red and yellow - as if the palette had been swept dramatically together in one fateful stroke - not at all.
It was as if I could see both my perspective and that of which came from beyond my sight, not the frozen snapshot of a single glance, but a picture that reached beyond the rigid geometry of binocular vision; a fusion of the collective observations of others and myself into one concentrated image.
The cascades of light from the streetlamp bent sharply into magnificent shapes, bouncing onto the blades of illuminated greenery that pierced through the rich darkness. I could see beyond the realms of one perspective
I could simultaneously see both the calm facade of an orderly spectrum and the chaos of a fragmented reality in a single glance.
I could see light and dark and all the tones in between; the alpha and the omega and the gammas and betas in between.
There was no shining light, no almighty being, just a mass of colours strewn across the sky.
I thought of the great Sutherland, who was commissioned to paint a full length portrait of the ‘dearly beloved’ politician’ Churchill; funded entirely by donations from the members of the house of commons and house of lords, in commemoration of his 80th birthday.
So set on capturing the ‘real person’ was the great Sutherland - as one undoubtedly should in the art of portraiture - that his disinclination to flattery was perceived as cruel and disparaging.
Upon viewing the work for the first time, Churchill described the work as ‘malignant’ and ‘filthy’, later posing it as "a remarkable example of modern art", combining "force and candour".
And then, of course, it was later found burnt to ash – perhaps, no indeed - at the request of Churchill himself.
I couldn’t understand it. It pains me that the people are so averse to truth, to authenticity, to any sort of connection with another being… Does it make them vulnerable, uncomfortable… not concealed by the veil of established behaviours?
That they would dare burn such a work in fear that they’ll be perceived in a more negative light?!
For fire should not conceal, but illuminate.
His eyes lingered in my mind. And I couldn’t bare seeing nothing behind them, those eyes that stare back at you with a sense of inherent discontent, an itch that can’t be scratched.
EULOGY SAMPLES/HIGHLIGHTS REEL (2020):
DAD, TECH AND MISSED SOCIAL CUES (but building community nonetheless)
When it came to tech, Dad was a bit of a boomer, but he did eventually embrace the digital realm with his storytelling skills.
If anyone has visited Dad’s Facebook profile in the past few years, you’ll know he really took the ‘book’ part of Facebook a bit too literally. The guy had the longest average status length of any human I have ever seen on Facebook.
If anyone has visited Dad’s Facebook profile in the past few years, you’ll know he really took the ‘book’ part of Facebook a bit too literally. The guy had the longest average status length of any human I have ever seen on Facebook.
Straight up, one time on his Facebook wall, he legitimately shared the photo of a girl at school that I had a crush on, and commented on its artistic merit. Thanks Dad. Champ.
Dad did have redeeming qualities though. I promise.
Take his 2019 classic on Islamophobia in the UK: 3992 words. The type of essays that high school students lose sleep over writing in their final exams are the sort of things that Dad would just casually broadcast to the world on a Tuesday evening on the fly, and seemingly without regard for degree of audience engagement.
I tried to introduce him to Medium to get him to actually publish his statuses as articles, but Dad and change aren’t really friends. Dad couldn't, but let's hope we've learned how to befriend change, or at least become friendly acquaintances.
Now, we want today’s affair to be a balanced picture.
On one hand, this is a chance to share stories of several entertaining Simon anecdotes and stories, and celebrate some of his brilliant qualities and quirks.
On one hand, this is a chance to share stories of several entertaining Simon anecdotes and stories, and celebrate some of his brilliant qualities and quirks.
But in addition, it is a time to acknowledge some of his unfortunate challenges and remind one another of the importance of speaking openly about mental health and seeking professional help.
Dad was a complex character. He was no gentle sudoku in the Sun-Herald.
Dad was a man of many words and few changes.
Dad was a man of many words and few changes.
But it wasn’t just food that dad went back for. As many of you would likely know, Dad never failed to strike up a conversation, no matter the context. This often resulted in uncomfortable situations with strangers where Dad would be asking all the wrong questions, and wouldn’t always pick up on social cues.
But of those conversations, apparently a few were tolerable: It was admirable to watch how Dad built a community from the Coogee area, remembering even the smallest details about people he met along the way.
I cannot remember a single walk from Dad’s front door to even the Laundromat - 2 minutes away - where dad didn’t say hello to someone, and proceed to enter a long-winded conversation of absolutely no relevance.
Dad tended to have an arrogance that he knew the most about whatever topic was in question, however I can share that he softened this stance, at least on occasion. Over the years he began to acknowledge my increasing passion for and understanding of art, so much that at the 2018 Archibald Prize I distinctly remembering him asking me, “Billa, what is it that makes me like this painting so much?”. Dad asking someone else to help him understand his opinions? Surely not.
AN EQUALLY ABSURD RESPONSE TO A POORLY EXECUTED END: inkedbybella - nondescript animals, tattoo practice
Dad thought tattoos were for criminals, veterans, and gang symbols.
Good thing Dad wasn't still kicking to see me become a licensed tattoo artist, specializing in an absurd, surreal, illustration style; intentionally absent of neurotic analysis, meaning, and the sentimental architecture of memory-induced attachment that compels the act of seeking a permanent reminder. Memento style.
Creativity flourishes within changed parameters.
In all seriousness, this practice revealed itself to me in the wake of grief, loss, and distress: In the ambient zone of suicide-induced imminent funeral planning, workdays spent sifting through emails and messages to form a surprise guest list, unexpectedly learning how to project manage a memorial event of this emotional weight + circumstance, there emerged within me an unprecedented resistance to detail, to certainty and exactness.
What was once a lifelong quest to capture the world around me - a realistic, holistic perspective through my precise eyes - melted into an absurd puddle of utter silliness.
And the only reasonable, measured, and intuitive sense that was felt in that moment, the path to follow, was to put pen to paper and tesselate amorphous blobs with delicate linework. Eventually, unbeknownst to me, this was the seed that planted and sprouted a licensed tattoo practice and my multi-year, extensive body of work, inked permanently into the human bodies of my fellow sentient beings; emotionally driven travelers with a lifelong affinity to art, commemorated for time immemorial.
Art imitates life; life imitates art.
The two-way process is an endless upward spiral of visual, spatial, multisensory joys.
Here's some evolution of squiggles:
