Linda Olsson

...I still saw everything through the filter I had created in order to survive. I could not see the happiness that preceded the abyss. I had forced myself not to acknowledge my life's most splendid moment, in order to be able to live out the rest of my life without it. I think that was what had happened. It has changed since, but back then it was impossible for me to embrace the happiness I had lost.

I have stopped painting. I stand in front of the easel, brush in hand, but my mind is blank. It is as if I have been struck by a strange kind of blindness.

I had accepted that all the dark memories were mine. But I had never realized that the beautiful ones were mine too. I had a right to them. And the right to embrace them, regardless of what happened before and after. I had a right to my happiness, as well as my grief.

It's often about the simple things, isn't it? Painting and photography are first about seeing, they say. Writing is about observing. Technique is secondary. Sometimes the simple is the most difficult.