Perspective

My dad once told me that every great painter creates a self-portrait. With that in mind, I decided to paint a humorous self-portrait: a four-foot canvas featuring only my eyes.

I suffered from chronic cluster headaches, the “most painful condition known to medical science,” nightly for over a decade. The condition causes ptosis and lacrimation - a drooping eyelid and tearing - so my left eye was often squinted shut on the pain side. That side of my head always felt groggy and ached.

I used parts of my face as a paintbrush. The eyebrows were painted with my eyebrows, the nose was painted with my nose, and the cheeks were painted with my cheeks.

I experienced life mostly through my right eye and the right side of my head that wasn’t in pain. My love of physics and astronomy helped me through those dark times, so you can see a reflection of the Milky Way in the right eye.

Fun fact: This painting began as a tree. The bridge of the nose was the trunk, and the eyebrows were branches.