'Half don’t come here…….so I do.’

 Have you ever had a friend who was like a rainbow of light and colour?

A feisty ball of energy, so stylist, so beautiful, wonderfully creative, completely loyal, totally encouraging and supportive.

A natural comedian, someone who could have you in stitches without even trying.

Yet someone you could be completely real with, stay up all night just talking.

Someone intelligent, strong minded yet compassionate beyond belief.

A friend who invites you in to share with them their wonderfully unique world.

A friend you find yourself talking proudly about so often, almost boasting about them to others, boasting of how blessed you are to have such a wonderful person in your life…..

This is Chiara.

I had wanted to paint Chiara for a long, long time (for obvious reasons)

We had talked about it many times before and being so supportive and encouraging she was very happy to star in one or two of my paintings.

So in May when she came down for one of her flying visits I was so pleased and excited to finally have her sit for me.

I do have to say though, even though we had discussed this often, I did spring it on her this particular day in May.

So after a bit of “I’d have worn more make up if I had known it was going to be today!” And some “Oh come on, you look amazing and I actually prefer not to paint too much make up”, we got to talking about how we’d go about it.

I’d been thinking a lot about the direction I wanted to take my work in over the next few years and how I might want to approach certain subjects.

Chiara was always a great person to talk to about these things; she had studied at art school and worked at the Tate for many years.

We decided that she were to be portrayed (quite rightly so) as a strong, confident, dynamic woman!

We had great fun with the photo shoot, if a little funny and awkward at times and off she want back to London.

Going through the ideas I chose three photos to work from for two paintings.

Very excitedly, I told her of my choices and explained my ideas but rather frustratingly I knew due to finishing off other work and my children being off school for the summer holidays I wouldn’t be able to start painting them until the beginning of September.

I saw Chiara twice more, once in London in July and once when she came down in August.

On September the 4^th Chiara was in a road traffic accident and was taken from us.

No words can even begin to describe how heartbreakingly devastating this is.

Chiara had such a huge impact on so many people; she’s not someone who could be easily forgotten.

It would be more than fair to say that she was favoured by many and favourite to many.

She meant so much to me; we’d been friends since doing our A-levels together.

She helped me on my journey to becoming me; she is and will always be a big part of who I am.

She never once let me down, she was always there, always loyal.

To quote a mutual friend, “she was like a beacon of light”.

I really hope she knew just how much I treasured having her in my life.

I decided it would be the right thing to do to carry on with the paintings exactly as planned.

It did cross my mind that I should maybe go back through the photos and try to find a smiley one or something, but that didn’t feel right.

It seemed authentic and true that I should carry on as planned.

It felt like unfinished business, like things weren’t quite over yet.

With the suddenness of her going and not being able to at the very least even say goodbye, continuing on with these paintings has been a way of feeling like things hadn’t quite finished.

This is the first (I'm still working on the other)…..

It goes without saying that painting this has been an extremely emotional time, like a heartbreaking privilege of sorts.

I know she was so excited to see them finished, she texted me in June asking how it  was going, telling me to hurry up and get started as she needed a new facebook profile picture.

There would have been times when it was going well, that I would have sent her a work in progress shot.

And having finished this one now, not being able to show her is so hard.

When we talked about the concept of this particular painting we talked about names,

I remember Chiara joking about something along the lines of “Twice the Chi fun”.

The name for the painting came to me whilst listening to a song by her all time favourite band Reef:

Please take the time to listen…..

This song has been a real comfort to me since loosing my lovely friend.

I don’t want to sound trite but sometimes it even feels as though she’s trying to comfort me through it.

So I have named this painting after one of the lines in this song…

‘Half don’t come here…….so I do.’

Yes, there’s a bit of a pun in there. I’m not ashamed, I like a good pun.

But really, Chiara did not do things by half, she lived life to the full, she didn’t come in half measure and we all loved her for it.

I miss my wonderful friend more than words can say.

I love you Chiara... so, so much.x