‘I rediscovered my childhood passion’ How picking up a brush has enriched Fiona Gibson’s life
Fiona Gibson had always loved painting when she was young but gave it up when grown-up life got in the way. It took a chance moment on holiday to change everything
My family and I were on holiday in Brittany. My husband was reading, and our three children were playing in the orchard next to the holiday house. I picked up a notebook
I’d brought with me and spotted my daughter Erin’s set of watercolours lying nearby. In silence, apart from the lazy hum of the bees, I started to paint.
It was nothing spectacular – a sketch of Erin’s beach bag, multicoloured like Elmer the elephant. I hadn’t painted for 30 years. However, in my youth, I’d loved to draw, copying fashion illustrations from Jackie magazine and the pictures on the front of Mum’s dress patterns. At 17,
I’d applied to go to art school, but my portfolio of schoolwork was pretty rubbish and, unsurprisingly,
I didn’t get in.
Instead, I fell into a career working for magazines and writing novels. My love of art went the way of my other childhood pursuits, such as
Girl Guide camps and Osmonds posters, consigned to the past. Until that holiday, when, bitten by the bug again, I spent every spare moment sketching. We’d visited the same remote farmhouse many times, but our twin sons seemed to be outgrowing the place; it was a little too quiet for them. I painted the garden, with its enormous fig tree and roses, where we’d had numerous barbecues over the years. I knew we were unlikely to return, and it felt important to capture everything I loved about the place.
FINDING MY FEET
Years passed, that holiday sketchbook forgotten, until one day, I came across it again. I photographed a few of those tentative sketches and nervously shared them on Facebook. Friends were incredibly kind about them and, boosted by their encouragement,
I started sketching and painting, filling book after book with my fledgling efforts. Crucially, my husband, Jimmy, and I were empty-nesters now – our sons are 23, our daughter 20 – and finally I had the time to do something purely for myself.
Keen to improve, I signed up for art courses and studied books on technique. Gradually, I was discovering that art didn’t have to be 100% accurate to have charm. There was no need to spend hours painstakingly drawing a bowl of fruit. It could be much freer than that – and fun.
THE NEXT STEPS
I went out sketching in my home city of Glasgow, embarrassed, at first, whenever anyone came over to peek at what I was doing. I loved drawing shop fronts and cafes, and couldn’t help laughing when an elderly man peered over my shoulder and said, ‘Why are you drawing that? You should be up at Loch Lomond!’ I’d got over my shyness, and if anyone thought it was weird to see a 50-something woman perched on a fold-up stool, drawing the local chippie… then so what?
Through a short art course I’d done, I was invited to exhibit at a local gallery and I sold a painting – I couldn’t believe it! Friends were also commissioning paintings of their pets, their favourite places or my own imagined landscapes. Shy of actually charging them money, I suggested they donated to charity, and I’ve now raised around £10,000. There have been other unexpected joys, too, such as making new friends through art courses – three of us are even planning an exhibition together.
Rediscovering painting has enriched my life and given me ‘something for me’ that’s incredibly fulfilling. I carry a sketchbook in my bag and draw wherever I go. If I’m stressed, it relaxes me. Nothing gives me more pleasure than when a painting turns out well.
I thought I’d lost that part of me – the girl who loved to while away hours surrounded by paper and paint – but it just took a chance moment on holiday to remind me that she
was there all along.