J F Caro
My great granduncle, Rafael Eiroa, was an artist in the late XIX century Spain. One of his paintings was in my parents’ home which I could see from my bedroom. It was a middle age woman sitting in a dilapidated straw chair. Her face was void of expression, her eyes unfixed and gazed into space. It was almost as if she was waiting to catch the opportunity she did not have. Every night I fell to sleep thinking about her, about opportunities, the future, and most definitively that I wanted to paint like my uncle Rafael.
After the Spanish Civil war, my family like many others immigrated to America looking for the freedom they did not have under the fascist dictatorship of Francisco Franco. I still remember vividly those 21 days crossing the ocean aboard the ship Buena Esperanza (Good Hope). My uncle’s large canvas painting was carefully removed from the frame by my father, rolled and stored into a trunk labeled “memories from Spain”.
We settled in Uruguay, a small country between Argentina and Brazil, made entirely of European descendants. Uruguay was nicknamed the “Switzerland of l America”. For it was the prospect of freedom, education and opportunity that lured my family to transplant from Spain to Uruguay. Many years had passed before my mother decided to open the trunk. The canvas was severely damaged. At every turn of the flattened roll the oil paint had chipped away. I was a teenager and had forgotten the woman sitting in a chair. Nevertheless, my parents knowing my interest for art suggested that I repair her. I bought oils and brushes and I did it! I knew then what I wanted to become. But when I told my father about my desire to enter the school of art he said “study son, you will always have time to paint”.
I became a physician and soon after graduation I moved to the USA with my wife and daughter looking for freedom and opportunities, like my parents did. It has been a great 40 years journey but I never found time to paint like my father said.
Thus, I left medicine and science at age 60 to find time to paint. Metamorphosis/evolution/transformation/change…we must accept, embrace and not be afraid of. The power of a role model, of someone saying “I want to be like you”. There is no doubt that my life experiences in medicine will influence my perception and doing of art. And how I will loop in my learning of art back into medicine and society at large is only in my imagination. Will I have enough time? But if only a few in my social network, that are frozen in their success or misery, have the courage of real transformation, I would say this effort is not in vain. And it does not appear to be in vain since my youngest son Rafael came to see me yesterday suggesting his interest in art. After reading this statement he smiled and firmly said “I will start a career in art this fall semester”. If I finish wanting to paint like my uncle Rafael and my son Rafael, I would say it is not a bad way to end.
