If Vincent had Theo…

Okay, so I have delusions of grandeur (I’m pretty sure I’m not the only artist who has) (the fact I call myself an artist lol) ~ but seriously, I am nothing if not GRATEFUL to God, forever, for giving me Bassints ~ that’s what I’ve always called my sister, Jacinta.

(I’m not sure now of the etymology; I think it might have come from Jacinta, Bacinta (portmanteau of 'Beautiful Jacinta'.)

Above is my favourite picture of us (at least, the one that’s readily available ^^) taken on Halloween back in 2012.

As is the way of these posts these days, this one was brought on by this article that came into my inbox this past week about Jo van Gogh-Bonger, Vincent’s sister-in-law, and how we’re always going to owe her for our forever love affair with her famous brother-in-law.
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If Theo had Jo…

While I do have a most excellent brother-in-law (Bassints is an only sister ^_~), Chito, to whom I am also greatly indebted, the Daily Art Magazine piece very naturally made me want to write about my own (if you will allow me) Theo.

This is a detail of a small watercolour I made featuring one of my favourite literary couples, Maximilian and Valentine (Count of Monte Cristo). Being perennially broke I gave this to her as a present a while back because (although I didn’t mean it when I made it) M&V reminded me of, well, C&C (Bassints is Cinta to everyone else ^^).

I’ve always been and will always be super appreciative of everything Bassints has and continues to do for me as an artist, but not since reading Ledys Chemin’s article had it occurred to me to consider, more closely, my sister’s role in my practice.

I’m pretty sure this isn’t the first time I’ve referred to her as my Theo (here in the jillablog or elsewhere), but this may be the first time I’ve fully, really appreciated what it really means to call her that.
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Back at the ex-house…

…which is what I call my parents’ house (and which, regretfully I will soon call my ex-ex-house, Bassints and I shared one of the two rooms upstairs (the other room being my parents’). It was a rectangular room which was quite readily delineated (by my junk, the headboard of her bed, and our bathroom door) into two square halves for each of us. Her half had our closet and the bedroom door.

Fortunately for both of us, she was out most of the time ~ I was 17 when she was born (she looked more like the debutante than I did at my 18th birthday lol), so, I was already playing hermit crab in our room making things (although I was (also) using my dad’s then home office as my studio downstairs.

My activities often encroached on her half of the room (sorry, Bassints) ~ last month’s post shows me drying my stretched paper on her bed (which you can see below on the right side of my canvas) ^^;

But I’ll always be grateful for her extreme patience and tolerance, especially when I was in painting factory mode and I was cramming things all night. It couldn’t have been easy for her because, well, I’m not a very easy person to live or get along with even when I wasn’t in painting factory mode ^^;;;; Even by our (Addams) family’s standards, she must’ve been really weirded out (gross understatement).

In spite of my *eccentricities*, she always…

…encouraged me any way she could, and I’m ashamed to say (at the risk of sounding super materialistic (which I confess I am) how I super love and cherish all her little ‘go go you can do it’ prezzies <3 Like she bought me this adorable little cup (which I still use to this day, photo was posted back in 2014) because she knows how much coffee I drink in the painting factory…

…and these muffins a year before that whilst I was in the middle of what must’ve been Horselords. And believe me, if I took a photo of every single little thoughtful gift she’s ever gotten me over the years (and continues to get me now, whether it’s to keep me going during cramming for a show or just, keep me going in general ^^), this post would be a bazillion pages long ^^;

And the Best Artist’s Model Award goes to… ​

Bassints has also posed for me (willingly and un-) literally since she was a baby ~ I’m fairly sure I have that first sketch of her I made when she was a baby (looking like a little red furry bat when Mom first brought her home from the hospital ^3^). Unfortunately, my portraiture skills are hit-and-miss at best when it comes to likeness, so, I can’t ever say I’ve ever been able to do her justice.

But I can say I nailed likeness with this piece LOL I think she let me make this cast of her back in 2012 for an art class I was teaching (as you know, I don’t teach anymore).

She also even got her friends to sit for me (oh my giddy aunt, I never once thanked them (let alone paid them) for my 2017 show, Revellers -_-|||

​And speaking of shows…

… she’s been to every single one of mine ^_^ AND even made the invites for some of them <3 This one for Pista is my favourite…

I’m hoping she’ll be able to emcee (my sister is a woman of many talents ^_^ /) the opening of my show this year <3 (I say ‘hope’ because well, at the time of writing I’m hoping to be able to finish all the pieces!) 

The Jo to my Theo…

Not that she did it for me haha but Bassints also married the best brother-in-law a girl could have ~ effectively doubling her support for my practice. And really, even if the article that spurred this one hadn’t been about Jo instead of Theo, I really couldn’t write about Bassints without writing about Chito, too.

Bassints (and other sane people ^^) may have a little something to say about this, but I’ve always regarded *threatening bodily harm to another on behalf of a loved one* as a solid expression of love ^o^; I did have one brother sort of do this for me once (and another brother who did but I’m not sure he did it for me o_o|||).

But it was my brother-in-law who did actually do this for me ~ he may not have known it (or maybe even meant it) but it did mean a super lot to me when he did  <3

Once was when a gallery manager was giving me a hard time, and once when another gallery ‘accidentally’ had merchandise for sale with my work on it (well, this one was *threatening a lawsuit* ^^) (the ‘we’re gonna sue the pants offa you’ letter he wrote really was scary) ~

I thought (and still think) those were really sweet of him to do <3
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Louder than words…

A tradition we have back here has a prospective groom *fetching water*, *chopping firewood* and doing other such chores at the prospective bride’s house.

While it might be construed as part of that tradition, Chito-kun has hefted my insanely heavy 4-foot, dust-covered canvases and frames when I moved into the (soon to be ex-) jillahouse ~ and sneezed so much while he was at it, I thought, ‘dang Bassints better marry this guy’) ^^;

He even assembled my desk AND gave me the desk light on it (which has been indispensable to me in my work)…
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AND AND When I turned 50 last year, he even made me ramen <3 (the guy can cook ANYTHING; if all else fails (which it couldn’t possibly if he tried) he can always give Gordon Ramsay a run for his money ^^) ~ which I ate out of a bowl I made at the pottery class he and Bassints took me to for my birthday <3

AND AND AND (‘and, and, effin’ and? ^o^) he even took his Mom to my last gallery show, and I remember she was so kind <3
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I’m very, truly, really, super grateful for *Theo and Jo*…

…because you know, the things I’ve described here are just the *toppy tip* of what *Bachito* have done for my practice ~ and the super duper uber ultraelectromagnetic tip of the Titanic iceberg of what they’ve done for me outside of it (like that time they rescued me in the middle of the night from ~ well, anyway ^^;)

Believe me, I have a very real phobia (like the one I have of certain amphibians) of being the *pain in the backside sister-in-law* ~ it may not look it but I like to think I at least try not to abuse their kindness u_u;

I regret very much that it took a random email newsletter to bring home to me more than ever how much I owe Mr and Mrs L, but, as belated as these rambling and haphazard expressions of thanks are, I do mean them. Honest.

(> ^-^)> Thank you Bassints x Thank you Chito-kun <( ^-^<)

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