THE BEAUTY OF LIVING AND DYING - A TRIBUTE TO LIFE'S FINAL CHAPTER -
This project was born out of grief, a time when Carla's Father was dying and the world had been locked down in 2020.
For weeks, her only escape was a handful of flowers, a piece of black cardboard, and a small space.
Some of her flowers were in the stages of dying, just like her Father. She studied them curiously as they changed shape and form, finding them enchanting just as they were when they were in full bloom. She saw her Father as an old man at the end of his life, still dignified, as the lines blurred with the tall, handsome man she knew as a child.
She sat embroidering her flowers with her Father, sharing stories, memories, laughter, and tears as he gently surrendered to saying goodbye. She stitched little bits of gold on a leaf or a stamen, like one would embellish a couture gown, or to pay her respects to the creativity of Mother Nature. In each gold stitch, our stories — our past, the present, the old, the new, and the heartbreak of passing — were sewn together.
In the heightened awareness of death, the smallest things seemed to hold great wonder. She saw life in all its stages as ethereal and fragile, and discovered even in dying, in heartbreaking circumstances, there can be beauty, grace, and dignity. Beauty - A thing or person that delights the senses
