Bill Watterson, the cartoonist, created fantastic seasonal worlds in his strip, Calvin and Hobbes, which fills me with a sense of nostalgia. You may think it is strange to juxtapose a comic strip against gallery art, but in essence, this particular strip has had as much influence over me as any other artistic medium. Bill Watterson’s world transports me back to being four years old in New Jersey. The landscape is the same: a suburban area backing onto forests and creeks. At least that is the memory I have of it. One of my favourite games back then was “camouflage.” I would tape leaves all over my body – on my t-shirt, on my knees – and I would hide in a bush and call my mother out from the house. There was not much foliage on the bush and I’m sure she could see me but she would pretend not to. She’d call out my name and ask where I was. Then I would jump out from behind the bush. She would act shocked and say she couldn’t believe I was behind it. I’ve never asked her about those games because I still want to pretend that she couldn’t see me. For that’s what it all comes down to in the end: regret, this permanent sense of the loss of innocence and of finding the beauty in that. I think the Japanese call it Wabi-Sabi. But then again, my father bought me a book of Francis Bacon’s art when I was a teenager. He said he bought it because my room reminded him of Bacon’s studio. Mick Halloran lives in Dublin