Held, Not kept

About the work

2026

2026

Acrylic, oil, ink, on canvas

100W x 100Ht x 4D cm (39.3″x 39.3 x 1.5″)

Where something once certain no longer holds.

Held, Not Kept reflects on the quiet dismantling of certainty and the stories we tell ourselves about permanence, belonging, and safety. More than a decade after an amicable divorce, I began to recognise that what had been disrupted was not simply a relationship, but a deeply held belief that once I was married, I had arrived somewhere secure.

Looking back, I can see how that loss of certainty continued to shape my choices long after the marriage ended. Old patterns repeated themselves beneath conscious awareness, revealing how deeply our early assumptions about love, attachment, and belonging can become embedded within us.

Through layered surfaces, interruptions, and traces of what came before, the painting explores the space between holding on and letting go. It reflects the moment when something once believed to be permanent is revealed to be temporary, and the slow process of understanding what remains when those foundations shift.

For me, this work marks an important point in my practice, where themes of attachment, permanence, abandonment, and the search for safety begin to surface more consciously within the work itself.