This is an painting I did with the $2 paint from office works and a cheap art journal from the newsagent. We went for a holiday down at Coolengatta and stayed a street away from where they had locked down the border between QLD and NSW. It was probably the first time I sat down to paint intentionally not just by the way whilst waiting or watching the kids at the park. I try to paint what see. Now looking back I can see I needed to work on my perspective and values. It is true if you don’t look back at your past work and cringe then it means you haven’t grown.
This took a good hour even though it was only on an A5 and I think looking back it’s because it’s using cheap paint so the colour isn’t as intense so when it dries you have to paint more layers and will use more paint. It is also cellulose paper which soaks up more paint.
At the time I was only painting, at best, every week or so and I recall I went through a paint set in a matter of months whereas my current tiny pallette gets more use yet lasts longer and is probably half or even a quarter of the volume.
This monument has the dates when the old border was created. You can see the blockage on the right. We were able to go jogging on the left up to the peninsula but if you were driving on the right you had to be careful to stay in the left lane and turn left else you ended up in the queue to go through the border. If you had a special border pass you could drive over. I recall the border closures divided families and seeing people pass things over the border dividers or having reunion picnics on father’s day. I was fortunate my parents worked across the border but had a border pass so was still able to travel across.
I feel it is almost a lifetime ago since we had the border closures and lockdowns. I vaguely remember the anxiety of getting the sniffles and keeping the kids home so we wouldn’t be the ones to cause the next lockdown. Or hearing of one person getting sick and looking at all the sites for potential contact, hearing more cases and listening anxiously to the radio /tv to see if there would be another lockdown, if we were impacted and when to co-ordinate kids pick up. I don’t recall doing much painting but certainly did one paint and sip afternoon. We ended up trying a lot of hobbies but sourdough and painting came later.
I’m thankful to those who worked hard to keep us safe and also provide means to be able to go out again. Also thankful that we were able to have a holiday amidst all the closures and lockdowns. It wasn’t long after this that we had floods also closing our schools.
On reflection this serves as an interesting analogy for God’s grace. We were temporarily separated by covid, like sin separates use from God and restrictions our choices. We were able to pass over the border only if you have a special border pass and met certain criteria. This is like how Jesus is our border pass (through his application on our behalf by dying on the cross for our sins) and allows us to pass over to the kingdom of God if we have Jesus as our Lord and saviour which is our only criteria for a border pass. This is God’s grace to us as we don’t deserve to pass over to the Kingdom of God. We are not citizens of that state. But by God’s grace we have been saved and can be there to be able to have holidays outside of lockdown.
“but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
Romans 5:8 ESV
https://bible.com/bible/59/rom.5.8.ESV
because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
Romans 10:9 ESV
https://bible.com/bible/59/rom.10.9.ESV
Rachel Fong Art 