Siassie Kenneally 8
The commitment, was the father said, when he said it directly. It scared me, but it made me think because he said he's not going to be there one day. And when he said that, that means I've got to pay attention. And because of that, then he must mean something... this is the time to do it, because this is our only time; this is what he meant.
When he said that, I didn't have time to do anything; I thought about nothing but studying and learning, and create my own skills, and getting skills from my father, mainly, because the skills that he had, and the smartness he had and the balance he had was perfect to me. That's how I started to think about to do with my art, was because he was teaching me about the landscape. And the landscape that he taught me was pretty important to a lot of people, and very, very important to so many people. And, not just to the hunters, it was very important to the people. And, it's always been important, because that's all we have in this world.
And the skills that they had one day came to me, and I thought maybe... I wondered... I drew a portrait of my grandmother's face during her drawing. And as I used to watch my grandmother do her own art, as for being an artist, it came to me eventually... my father, what my father taught me out on the land, then I decided to just one day because I was so interested in skills and knowledge, that I would teach and show a lot of young people, because one day we won't be here and my father kind of gave me the impression that he is the family of all kinds of people - that he would help everyone, and not just to help them, to take care of them too, and treasure them, and be a part of them. The drawing was giving me an idea to do with... because, it's real.