When I’m 62.
When I’m 62.
Turning 62 in the December 2024 was a significant milestone for me. Not a milestone age that would ordinarily be recognised by most. Sixty, yes, the beginning of the ‘senior years’ some do celebrate. Sixty-five signals the age of retirement for those coming to end of their working life. Sixty-seven can be celebrated now as this is when the age pension cuts in. Why was 62 such a pivotal age to celebrate?
No, celebrate is the wrong phrase. To acknowledge? To fear? To dread? Perhaps.
Two thousand and twelve (2012) was my annus horribilus, my terrible year. I was 49 years old. In the April my mother passed away after a brief illness which shook the tight family and devastated my father and elder brother. The loss of a partner and parent is significant, and we managed to soldier on through the months ahead. My father was elderly and in his mid 80’s. A typical for a man of that era, mum was the queen of domesticity, and we took a sharp learning curve with dad with both of us ‘boys’ looking after him. Dad was still spritely for his age and there was no consideration of putting him into a home for age care. My brother and I managed the best we could. I was working at the university and halfway through my master’s degree (MFA). My brother was not employed at the time due to illness, a heart condition that developed over the previous 5 or so years. Living close by and free during the daytime, my brother would stop by during the day and check on dad whilst I would pop in after work in the evening and do the same.
One of those evenings the following September, I called in to see dad. With a concerned look, he said it was strange that he hadn’t seen my brother that day. As this was unusual, I phoned him but without any answer. Dad and I decided to go around to his place and see if he was there. On arrival, the unit where he lived was locked up and silent except for the muffled sound of the television coming from the bedroom.
I immediately feared the worse and unfortunately, I wasn’t wrong. Breaking into his apartment, I found him lying in a near foetal position in bed, passed away in front of the TV. I came over and sat next to him, felt his hand, his forehead. Nothing but the coldness of death which is more shocking than seeing his lifeless body itself.
I didn’t make art for the rest of that year. At the start of 2013 I was halfway through my MFA and I needed to make art, to get back onto the ‘horse’ again. Since his death I had the vision of my brother lying there in bed imbedded deep within my mind, haunting me. I felt I needed to reproduce it, to get it out of my system. Requiem for my Brother was the first work I made in 2013 and depicted precisely how I found him on that tragic day. When making the image, I didn’t know if I would ever use it, even to exhibit it…but I was compelled to make it. I constructed the figures, set the scene, created the image, and let it sit until, yes, I felt this needed to be seen, to go out into world.
Though a difficult image to produce, it did its job and rekindled my desire to make art, to continue with my MFA, and as they say, the rest is history.
So why was 62 such a milestone birthday for me?
Simply because that is the age my brother never made it to. He was 61 and 11 months the day he passed, forever this. Sixty-two became a line in the sand for me, a day I dreaded, it was the age I became the older brother
Requiem for my Brother. 2013. Archival Pigment Ink on Aluminium.
In the collection of Latrobe Regional Gallery (LRG), Morwell, Vic, Australia.