Breaking the shadows

Painting date.

1997

Tuesday April 8th

I sit in my room with Ginny, and she tells me what happened over the break, and how the death eaters destroyed her home. I decide that I need to cheer her up. But how? Ginny have wanted to learn how to draw and paint for a while, so I ask: "Hey Ginny, do you still want to learn how to draw?"

Ginny: "Yes, of course, do you want to teach me?"

"Yes, but not here, you need to be inspired."

Ginny: "What do you have in mind?"

"You'll see."

I take my bag with art supplies and take Ginny's hand.

I drag her outside and we sit down on the grass outside the castle.

I open my bag and hand Ginny a canvas. I take a canvas myself too. And then I say: "I know this isn't drawings, but why don't we start by making a background and try to make a sketch on that when its dry?"

Ginny: "But I can't even draw."

"That's why we start with the background. Even if you just throw some colours together it can look really good."

Ginny: "Okay, I can try."

"Okay so I want something with blue, red and purple, and maybe some yellow."

Ginny: "Okay, do you think I can take the orange, and some pink and red?"

"Yes of course, that will look so good, I have different types of red and pink, you can choose whatever you want."

Ginny choses two pinks a hot pink and a rose pink, and then a scarlet red.

I chose a fiery rose pink and the same scarlet red with a lemon yellow with a French violet purple.

I place all colours on my palate, and we both get to painting, I take a small paintbrush and start in the left upper corner with some red, and from the right upper corner with the purple, and as they mix at the middle I take the two bottom corners with the pink and yellow and do the same thing, it makes a really nice middle where I make it a swirl so it looks like the colours are getting sucked in the middle. I look over at Ginny's painting and it looks really good, she has started at the top with her orange and moves down to the red and pink, she looks up at me and says: "Is this, okay?"

"Yes, it's really good, but you can make it look even better if you take some white, can I show you?"

Ginny nods and I take a little white on a small paintbrush and as I demonstrate I say: "You just want to let the white mix with the different colours, but not too much, just a little and just to make a difference so there isn't such a harsh line between the colours."

Ginny: "I think I understand."

I hand her the small paintbrush and go back to my canvas. It's actually already dry, I take a small pencil from my bag and start sketching a butterfly. With big wide wings, and with lots of detail on the wings. As I start painting the butterfly in shades of green and blue, I see that Ginny has started to sketch a butterfly as well, and she too paints it in shades of green and blue, just if a different order.

---

We sit outside for a while and we get done with our paintings, Ginny doesn't seem so impressed with herself, so I say: "It took me years to figure out to paint, and you did a really good job today, just trying something new."
Ginny: "You really think so?"

"I wouldn't say it if it wasn't true."

She leans in and kisses me: "I love you Harlow."

"I love you more Ginny."

She kisses me again and we pack the art supplies in the bag again and go inside for dinner. 

-------------------------

Puplished: 12-06-23