This is a painting called “Bagáiste” (Baggage) . It is watercolour on paper, 50×70 centimetres. The inspiration comes from my recent Camino in Spain even though the scene in the background is taken from a much earlier work and shows Donegall Square and the City Hall.  I thought that it was important to bring the Camino and my French friend Victor, he with the rucksack, to Belfast.

As a metaphorical image, emotional baggage can be defined as the carrying of all the disappointments, wrongs, and trauma of the past around with one in a heavy load.  We all carry it to a lesser or greater extent. However, the independence, self-reliance  and total detachment from our everyday lives that we can achieve on experiences such as Caminos, gives us the ability to not only become aware of but also to dump same in the recycling where it belongs.

The painting shows two  faceless men ( I seem to be getting very fond of them but there are a lot around these days) with a devil on their shoulders. A prime business type trailing her baggage, neatly secured under lock and key, a huge lady carrying the things of childhood in a large old brown paper bag and a twenty-something  still being lectured   by a ghost from the past. And there is Victor.