Occasinally friendships propel you into difficult territory. As a case in point, my lovely artist mate Karen Smith recently asked me to take part in an exhibition of painted coffin lids. This creeped me out to the degree that I (1) refused to participate and (2) when worn down by Karen’s nagging, said ‘yes’ but didn’t actually do anything until the last minute. I wasn’t the only one alarmed by the subject matter. I left the coffin lid in my office during the holidays, so I didn’t have to deal with it, and when I came back someone politely said words to the effect ‘get it the hell out of here’. Having procastinated thus far, I ended up painting the lid on my kitchen table, and it was still wet when the exhibition opened: sorry Karen!

Strangely enough, once I got over my initial combination of superstition, paranoia, fear and dread, I found this project really intriguing. A life coach once gave me an exercise- imagine you are at your own funeral: what do you hope people say about you?- as a way of focussing on what I thought was most important in my life. The coffin lid did the same thing. It is based on one of my favourite books, Moby Dick, and my love of scrimshaw.