5/26/09 / Eloise Hamann (Mom)
Your surprise arrived today. It is a painting of you. You always wanted Attila to paint you. He has incorporated some of your ashes into the oil painting so it is truly you. It is based on a photo of you in St. Mark’s in Venice with pigeons, but is more you than that photo. I’m sure you’ll love it. It is amazing.
You can't see that your name is on the newspaper tucked into the shirt wrapped around your waist nor part of the title of your poetry book: Limmaginazione violenta
Love, Mom
PS Here is an excerpt of an email describing your adventures with your friend, Attila Richard Lukacs
hi ELOISE!!!
well....a thousand pardons for my tardy correspondance.
much has happened between now and when i said that
you would get shannon's portrait by x-mas. did i say what year?
anyway the piece is done and we made a good crate for it here in the
studio,
just a matter of getting it to you. the size of the painting is 4' x
7'.
i can't recall now when i started the drawing for his portrait. but i
do recall
that shannon was always bugging me that i should paint him, and
insisted that
i would do his portrait one day. hmmm, guess he was right. i've never
done this before.
so i sifted and ground down his ashes in a mortar to as fine a powder
as i could get.
mixed it into the paint and noticed that it did discolour the paint in
not the best way.
but the ashes did make it in almost all the painting - the flesh tones
and rays.
in the mean-time, those years passing in between, shannon has been my
constant
companion, here and in my travels. in '07 when i went to maui, i took
small bag of some of the
ashes too coarse to paint with so that i could spread them. knowing
and loving maui,
i think it is a place where spirits exist, and thought shannon might
like to share a vacation.
to the north i gave him to the sand wind and sea on my favorite
beaches. to the west, on
the beautiful rocky lava cliffs in a wildlife sanctuary
where the fags cruised overlooking david bowie's, tiger woods',
michael jordan's and
opra's homes. to the south, as far as i could get that day, the
youngest part of the island
barren, black, like mars. to the east, on the way to another nude
beach a very old buddhist
cemetery where i always lay a rock. and then into the water on a
hidden red beach in
a fantastic natural amphitheater facing a fierce ocean. lastly at
almost sunrise, we had to
stop 'cause my moms got sick in the car from driving up the hairpin
curved road up
haleakala, the volcano, where the gods live, and some flora and fauna
that exist only
on our planet up there. to the wind the rock and the rising sun.
the year following i went to india, again with shannon in bag. do have
to agree that
it's cheaper to fly with a friend this way. i think this is when i
had done drawn the portrait, and
i was leaving, and often it's hard to come back and do something
you''ve been away
from. so i took his book, read a poem everyday when i got there, GOD
knows he was good.
so slowly the ashes spread from the palms of buddha, to the streets
and finally for their intended
purpose at the end of my trip, we sent him down a sacred river with
the proper rites and rituals.
on a woven bamboo basket, with flowers from the garden incense and a
prayer to shiva .
and this last year, even though we just went 2 years ago, maui again.
by now back in vancity i was cursing shannon for his vanity.
ohhh...... i have a video of shannon's india river ride and i'm going
to send that to you as well.
the remainder of shannon's ashes, and i did think you sent too much at
the time,
are comfortable here, i enjoy having shannon around,in spirit .....
and our travels haven't ended. i remember now in "03 when i was in
india, shannon and i emailed
each other a lot, my first time there, he wanted a portrait as soon
as i got back, i talked him down to a a tattoo design.
even then he wanted his face on the body of a hunky st. michael. lets
face it he was vain,........
but he wanted to be there in india it was a destination he had hoped
for one day.
shannnon is sittin here in a wooden crate which he never wanted....are
you around to receive
it?
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