I first met my neighbor Aapo not long after my beloved father died.
Though I’m not especially religious, I was convinced that my father, a General Electric employee by day and an amateur artist in his spare time, had planted an artist in my newly adopted state of California. My father and I shared a passion for painting. I don’t think we believed places really existed in time or in memory unless they had been observed, interpreted and captured by an artist.
Day after day, I would walk my dog, Lolita, by Aapo’s magnificent work until, one morning we met. Thinking that Aapo was completely unknown and merited kind words of support from an art lover, I told him that he was “a major talent” -- something the international community had apparently already discovered!
A few years later, in December of 2009, Aapo’s “Window to Europe” exhibition at the Malaga Cove library lured me in honor of my mother, who was French, and who had died the same year as my father. There, I saw new paintings -- in one of the watercolors, Aapo had captured the haunting, spiritual beauty of Meteora, Greece. His paintings of local scenes around Palos Verdes somehow made an East Coast native feel more at home.
When the time came for the opening’s “Portrait Lottery,” Shullie Neumark, the 2008 winner, to my utter shock, called out my daughter Juliette’s name. Juliette was twelve, an age, when, as Aapo put it, “She does not know, yet, how beautiful she is.”
Before I had a moment to absorb our good fortune, Juliette matter-of-factly ordered me to “Get the dog,“ a 16 year-old Bichon-Jack Russell my daughter has loved her entire life.
In film, the cardinal rule for a successful, controlled studio environment is: ‘no children and no dogs.” Aapo handled both with skill and uncommonly good nature. He and I even took turns holding treats when it was time to capture details in the dog’s face.
The finished pastel of Juliette and Lolita shall forever endure as one of our greatest Christmas memories; and my neighborhood now exists, with greater intensity and permanence, because Aapo has painted it.
Fabienne Marsh,
novelist and filmmaker
© 2009 Aapo Pukk. Reproduction and usage of images in print and as a part of website template by written permission only. Phone 310-750-6098.
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