CarpeNoctem

CarpeNoctem~ 
A painting of a photograph of a memory.
Oil paint on canvas 
byJasonKoharik 2015-2020 

Throughout the last 5 years or so,in my endlessly sleepless nights, I would walk. Night walks. Having a “smart phone” was new to me... a blinded decision I made that never felt quite right. It still does not.
Although, suddenly, there was a camera in my pocket. I took pictures of the night. CarpeNoctem is what I called call it. Looking back, most of those walks, those photographs, were associated with memories, some good, many with sadness and hurt. Recently, I have been painting those photographs, night scapes of floral portraits, a subject I collect, and otherwise paint. Painting, I have been thinking, is the oldest joy I can remember in all my life. My son paints with me now. He paints floral portraits because I paint floral portraits. Although, his Joy, so obvious,is his own. While mine now, may just be his as well. 

We tramped the open moorland in the rainy April weather
And came upon the little inn that we had found together
The landlord gave us toast and tea and stopped to share a joke
And I remember firelight
I remember firelight
I remember firelight
And you remember smoke
We ran about the meadow grass with all the harebells bending
And shaking in the summer wind a summer never-ending
We wandered to the little stream among the river flats
And I remember willow trees
I remember willow trees
I remember willow trees
And you remember gnats
We strolled the Spanish marketplace at 90 in the shade
With all the fruit and vegetables so temptingly arrayed
And we can share a memory as every lover must
And I remember oranges
I remember oranges
I remember oranges
And you remember dust
The autumn leaves are tumbling down and winter's almost here
But through the spring and summertime we laughed away the year
And now we can be grateful for the gift of memory
For I remember having fun
Two happy hearts that beat as one
When I had thought that we were "we"
But we were "you and me".

Dimension 12”x12”