Introducing Susan MacLeod, Cartoonist-in-Residence at Grief Matters!
Photo by CBC
Recently, my drawing practice has turned to creating grief and death stories in the hope my cartooning can lessen my real fear of death, grief, and loss as I age.
I’ve been drawing people in nursing homes for well over ten years now. When my mother was a resident, drawing there was my way of coping with a situation that frightened me: institutions housing the old, the infirm. People there were unpredictable and unattractive with sorrows and frustrations.
But that was not their dominant story.
Through drawing I grew to see and to love these same people. I began to care for who they truly were beyond their suffering and their limitations. In part, that’s because drawing, cartooning, and visual storytelling can convey the nuances of various emotional impacts, joyful and painful, to create a direct understanding of difficult life experiences.
Drawing is connecting, seeing. Personally, I find this makes it all a tad easier to bear.
Let us know what resonates with you as we explore drawing death and grief with Grief Matters.
Our first Grief Matters cartoon was inspired by Mary Ellen Macdonald's Globe and Mail First Person article, May 15, 2023: Yard sales are often about grieving (not just good deals) - The Globe and Mail]
Susan MacLeod Cartoon
