This is a photograph of a painting by Gisela. If you expand the scale you will see the delicacy of the brushstrokes and the grain of the canvas. Gisela gave me the painting in 2013 when she came to stay with me in York. You see it here in my flat in Berlin, where I now live. In fact, however, this is not exactly a photograph of a painting. Instead, it is a photograph of a photographic reproduction – printed onto canvas – of a painting.
From one scholar intrigued by questions of authenticity and its reworkings to another equally so occupied, this was a perfect gift. It was another example to add to our discussions – which maybe that evening also included not only Halloumi but the case of Yorkshire Fettle, as the local feta-like cheese had been renamed.
In giving me an image of Cyprus, Gisela was sharing a place that meant so much to her, and to Stefan, personally as well as professionally. Looking at it brings other images swimming into my mind of photographs that they showed me of their time there. I have never been to Cyprus. In giving it to me, however, Gisela was also playing creatively with ideas of heritage and kinship – as her work wonderfully shows that people so often do. Instead of a reminder of something that had happened, the picture serves as a reminder for the future. This is that I should one day visit Cyprus, not least because my own kinship had become entangled with it – my daughter’s husband’s family is from the island. As such, and as Gisela pointed out when she gave me the picture, I had a prospective future in which it might become even more part of my extended heritage. One day I will surely make that visit and I will see those mountains through the lens of this painting and memories. Thank you Gisela!