BLOG - Why a Hidden Butterfly?

It's part of my story. 
Butterflies have so many significant meanings to different people. But did you know it's also the national symbol for bereavement? I became painfully aware of this after 8 years of being a special-needs mother and then losing our son to heart disease and a genetic difference called idic-15. 
In probably the darkest time of our life, butterflies were also my inspiration to get back to my art again. I'd stopped painting for a few years, but became fascinated with butterflies in their natural or almost natural habitat. I would go to butterfly gardens across Florida and take pictures and then come home and create magnified  paintings of them up close in all of their brokenness. Butterflies have such brevity of life and many of them in the rainforest and enclosed habitats were extremely battered. I related at the time to that brokenness and that paint series ended up selling in an auction we held that benefited children's hospice - Pedscare. 
I've been thinking a lot lately about their meaning and how many people find inspiration in them for getting through a metamorphosis or change in their life.
 
Whatever the challenges or losses that we will all walk-through at sometime, butterflies offer inspiration.
So I decided to incorporate a small, obscure butterfly into each one of my paintings. I've gone back through most of the paintings in my studio and to make sure they each contain a hidden, somewhat camouflaged butterfly. Not too obscure but enough to search for it. When my second son was little we thoroughly enjoyed playing iSpy on the computer and similarly, I found so much joy in painting these butterflies thinking about the viewer searching for them. In a recent exhibit at JAX Airport, the travelers enjoyed the scavenger hunt as they passed through the show. 

Butterfly tips to know:

  1. Butterflies are universally recognized as symbols of change and new beginnings. 
     
  2. They are a national symbol for bereavement. This was deeply meaningful to me after losing our son, Joshua.
     
  3. Many of the butterflies I saw in nature were broken, yet they still carried immense beauty. When I began my journey back to painting after our loss, I found inspiration in this - a reminder that even in brokenness, there is grace.
     
  4. I have intentionally hidden one in each new work of art - offering viewers a chance to engage with the painting on a deeper level.
     
  5. The brevity of a butterfly's life teaches us to appreciate and savor life’s small, fleeting moments of beauty.
     
  6. Whether you are navigating change, loss, or personal growth, this hidden symbol in each painting serves as a reminder that beauty can emerge from even the darkest of times.

A butterfly lights beside us, like a sunbeam…
and for a brief moment it’s glory
and beauty belong to our world…
but then it flies on again, and although
we wish it could have stayed,
we are so thankful to have been graced by its presence.