I said, “Wouldn’t it be great if we put a piano in the lake?”

It was July. The water was unusually warm, which is good if you’re shooting underwater pictures as a family event. The object was to get some unique photo ops for Molly’s first album. Art and theatre background, costumes, a rag-tag flotilla, a discarded electric organ, fertile imaginations and Voila!

We encountered a few problems like the fact that the organ floated and the water-proof camera bag for the video camera wasn’t water-proof and getting the footage was pretty much random as it was impossible to see the viewfinder through the (not) water-proof camera bag, and sometimes shooting would have to wait for boat wakes to subside.

Ah, but it was glorious! Nothing like a challenge for the sake of art and love to make the blood rush. We got some amazing shots for Molly’s album and as it turned out, the inspiration for my series of paintings for this show, SEVEN SECRETS.

Born under the sign of Cancer I was a late bloomer and didn’t appreciate that I was a water baby until my late twenties when an afternoon cocktail at a bar on Maui turned into a scuba diving lesson and a major epiphany in my life.

Cut to a scene twenty years later. Location: Lost Lake, Washington. A gift from my Aunt Amy had allowed me to buy a tiny cabin and a yellow kayak. I was there to set everything up for the family’s arrival. I spent hours exploring the lake and paddling around its three islands, but didn’t go on the islands. I wanted to save something special to share with my husband and three children, Molly, Matt and Sarah.

I wanted a very special name for my kayak.

The family arrived. We paddled to the ‘big’ island and disembarked to explore. On a bed of moss as thick as a mattress I look down and see what appears to be litter. My intention is to remove it. It is a tattered box of matches – Rosebud Matches. I had found my kayak’s name. And, yes, the full implication of that classic film and all the symbolism of that last great scene is what it’s about.

Your first bike or sled or pony or kayak forever holds a special place in your heart. The thing that brings you into nature where there are promises in the horizon, where sky wraps around you and winds from far away places touch you on their forever journey – where freedom and beauty make it seem like anything is possible.

Rosebud and Lost Lake – sharing this with my family – hours of solitude drinking in perfection. This series is the most heart-felt I have done.

Annette Matrisciano, “Inanna”