This is another drawing drafted by Odhràn and essentially unmodified by myself. The scene of three figures placed in their order hierarchical, a child, a mother and a father stand separate in an ensemble. The child joyous and unprotected by any external structure, holds the hand of the mother who is standing in an abstract protective structure who in turn holds the hand of the father standing in another separate structured surrounding. The three figures are all united in the garden but are distinct individuals out of this plan. The garden here represent the playing fields of life in which we all stand. The only thing that unite them out of this is the effort they make to hold hands. Each individual has his or her own space in which they develop within the ensemble. The father stands in a house type structure with a protective roof and reaches out of this space to hold the hand of the mother implicating that he protect her with the character of his construction. The mother accepts willingly holding the fathers hand that forms a bouquet on the outside of either structure. The bouquet represents the flowering of their relationship and the fruit born of it. It is placed externally to either structure for this union is in its self an acceptation of each independent structure. The mother stands in an abstract surrounding structure with the child on one side and the father on the other. She takes up here the pivotal position of the family between the father and the child, while at the same time finding her own equilibrium which is represented here by the body substance, she is fulfilled. The abstract nature of her surrounding structure is the representation of the character needed to fulfill her womanly nature, flexible, adaptable but at the same time strong. The child stands with no protective structure around it, holding maternally to the mothers hand with the acute knowledge that the father is right there behind her. Vulnerable and care free it is an extension coherent of the other two figures. He has no structure as of yet, it is for himself to establish and erect this identity. The work of the family is to assist the child in this quest and as I have found it is no easy task and not to be taken lightly.
