The Fandangoe Child on Creativity as Catharsis
Artist Annie Nicholson, also known as The Fandangoe Kid, shares how grief has shaped her practice and discusses the complexities of using creativity to cope with trauma
A decade ago, artist Annie Nicholson, who goes by the name The Fandangoe Kid, suffered an unimaginable loss of family members in an accident in New York. She put her plans to use her graphic design degree on hold and began working on sketchbooks to process her grief.
"I've always been interested in exploring intimacy, the human condition, and our relationship with one another, which has always been a huge part of my job," Nicholson told CR. “But then this terrible loss derailed everything. Actually, I couldn't work in public at all. I couldn't show anything. I filled sketchbooks at home, but I had to survive for a couple of years. "
In her sketchbooks, Nicholson reflected on the sudden lack of dialogue with her mother and sister – people with whom she spoke regularly about her work. "The dialogue you had with people you were really close to suddenly turned into a monologue, and it was terrifying," she recalls. “I've been trying to find ways to open that up. I tried to keep a dialogue going but never got anything in return. I wrote down what I could say in a family conversation, recorded things and imagined what they would say in return – also for orientation. "
Upper picture: On the way to a new normal; Above: Baggage is just Nicholson's experience painting