We are small fragile bubbles within the larger bubble of life
This composition meanders as it floats upward from bottom left to upper right like a balloon. It slows to create a circle with the subjects heads as if they too were balloons, before wafting away, up and out of the scene. The activity involves us through a playful riot of pattern and color while the figures enact a more symbolic and private meaning.
Life is like a beautiful bubble which must inevitably burst. The dreams of youth escape our grasp and float away, as do our own lives and the lives of those we love. The boy chasing his dream balloons to the right wears the number 35. Vincent was 35 and suffering from PTSD when he had a serious mental breakdown. The next year his heart was also broken with the death of his 41 year old brother Edward, and how it left his niece Christine fatherless.
Christine is shown above as a young girl with an upside-down smiley face balloon. The balloon symbolizes her life about to be turned upside down. The upside-down smile also represents the grief she and her mother will soon endure. Christine's mother is seated next to her blowing up a blue balloon, and the man standing with the orange balloon is her father Edward. The large purple and white balloon leaving the frame above mirrors the smiley one below, as if it has slipped from the young girl's grasp and is rising out of the picture - symbolizing the death of her father. Both parents are diligently blowing up their balloons, filling their lives with hopes for their daughter Christine. She stares transfixed at the exiting balloon, with her expression strongly foreboding, now that we are familiar with the story. The child's recent loss of her tooth also signifies having to endure pain and loss growing up in life.
Vincent lost his father before he was born and when his oldest brother Edward was 4. For all of their lives Ed was like a father figure to Vincentl. The artist also imagines himself as an infant in his mothers arms as his big brother blows up the orange balloon symbolizing fatherhood. The dark haired woman looking away is his mother holding him as a baby, and who is at the same time watching him run away with his over sized bundle of balloons. Thirty five is the age at which Vincent's dreams seemed shattered, and a year before everyone's balloon would burst with Edwards death. The birds are a symbol of ever present hope, as they land with practicality on solid ground.
There are three levels of depth to much of Smarkusz's work: 1) A colorful and interesting composition, enjoyable on it's own without regard to any deeper meanings, but then you suspect something else is involved and you realize 2) A symbolism or metaphor of some general and significant human truth, which many times 3) is portrayed by actual people known to the artist. Of course, as an artist he wanted to produce works which could stand on their own as aesthetically pleasing, but he also wanted to say something meaningful and significant. He clearly also enjoyed the process as a form of therapy, catharsis and closure concerning unresolved issues in his personal life. Vincent also satisfied his childlike mischievousness by encoding many of his compositions with secret meanings or clues known only to him. I feel certain that he kept many of his works to look at in the process of healing the existential scars of a difficult life. Vincent was both his own savior and a tragic hero.
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