Of grief, and of coming to terms…
It goes without saying that an artist’s first solo exhibition is an important milestone. It’s a momentous event that stamps the artist’s commitment to a path chosen as one’s life pursuit.
My Journey, young artist Kimberley Boudville’s first solo outing, is certainly important in this regard, but there is another more personal reason that this solo exhibition is significant for her, far beyond what a debut solo typically means to an artist.
One year ago, Kimberley lost her father to cancer, at a relatively young 56 years of age. More than a debut solo, My Journey is Kimberley’s tribute to her late dad, to commemorate one year of his untimely passing.
Consisting of paintings and drawings, many of which were done in the months Malaysia endured the various stages of COVID-19 Movement Control, the collection of works included in this exhibition are testament to Kimberley’s versatility as an artist. Collectively, the artworks are a visual diary of a young woman faced with a tremendous personal loss, of coming to terms with it, and of the process of healing that necessarily follows.
Within the outpouring of sadness that is to be expected under such circumstances, there are frequent glimmers of hopefulness and flashes of positivity throughout the body of work. The journey we witness isn’t one of wallowing in sorrow, no self-absorbed pity expressed.
Rather, it is anguish in its purest form, of a child mourning the loss of a parent. It is traversing the stages of grief, presenting them for what they are, and emerging a year later perhaps not fully healed, but at peace with the loss, and accepting it as part of the cycle of life.
It is this very resilience we witness on this visual journey; traversing the process of healing, and of coming to terms with events, tragic as they may be, beyond our ability to control.
Kimberley may be young in terms of years, but there is an innate maturity expressed in her works. It is a fitting tribute to a father she loved, and undoubtedly loved her in return. But more importantly, My Journey is a declaration that Kimberley Boudville – the artist, and the person – has emerged through this much stronger than when she began.
Her father, we believe, would have been proud.
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