Child with Winter Robin
oil on aluminum panel, 10×10 inches
©2022 Fatima Ronquillo
for purchase inquiry please contact Meyer Gallery, Park City

If I Can Stop One Heart from Breaking

If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin
Unto his nest again
I shall not live in vain.

~ Emily Dickinson

I painted two winter scenes for Meyer Gallery in Park City, Utah. I love the calm and quiet hush of a landscape blanketed by snow. “Child with Winter Robin” was inspired by walking in the hills and trails of Santa Fe, where the sound of birds can be heard, almost as if spring is not long in coming. “Beloved with Amaryllis and Golden Arrow” is a reprise of a 2015 painting of the Amaryllis myth. This time the subject is the boy beloved by Amaryllis.

Beloved with Amaryllis and Golden Arrow
oil on aluminum panel, 14×11 inches
©2022 Fatima Ronquillo
for purchase inquiry please contact Meyer Gallery, Park City

I first painted the amaryllis story back in 2015. That first version featured the girl with the arrow wounding her heart.

The origin myth of the amaryllis flower has long fascinated me. There once was a shepherdess named Amaryllis who fell madly in love with Alteo, a handsome shepherd boy. Alas, he only had eyes for the plants and flowers he tended. She consulted the Oracle at Delphi and was advised to stand outside his house and pierce her heart with a golden arrow for 29 days. Drops of her blood collected in the ground and on the 29th day, blossomed into a beautiful red flower. Alteo was so stunned by the beauty of the flower and the girl that he returned her love and healed her heart. Happiness and love thus result from a tale which began full of unrequited longing and pain.

“Amaryllis and The Golden Arrow”
oil on panel, 12×9 inches
©2015 Fatima Ronquillo (private collection)