Boat!
So here's a bit of Chuang Tzu for you guys:
Confucius was driving through the desert when he got a flat tire. They had no spare, so his student called an auto mechanic from his cell phone. When the mechanic heard that it was none other than Confucius with a flat, he said, “Man, I really feel sorry for that guy.”
The student asked, “Is that because of the flat?”
The mechanic replied, “No, Confucius has far bigger problems than that!”
He explained, “Visiting a witchdoctor during the day could be a good idea, because he might give you some useful potions. Visiting a witchdoctor at night is just asking for trouble, because that's when they practice evil voodoo. What's more, if you invite a witchdoctor into your house to cast spells over your sleeping body, then chances are that you'll have quite a few nightmares. It seems to me that Confucius has invited a permanent witchdoctor into his home to cast spells over his disciples' sleeping bodies. The cursed master gets chased from city to city, not because he wants to travel, but because he wears out his welcome. Sometimes he goes without food, living on the verge of death! Isn't that some voodoo-inspired living nightmare?”
When the mechanic arrived with a tire, he exclaimed, “No wonder you don't have a spare: this is a boat! Although boats work wonders in water, it's super tough work to push them across land. It looks like Confucius is dragging the ideals of the past around like this heavy boat. No wonder he has so many problems! I'll tell you, each era and place has different properties for you to consider before you can freely move around in it. If you try to conform the era or place to your ideals, it'll be like pushing a boat across land: too much struggle with too little accomplishment. Instead of this tire, I'll offer you advise. Just go with the flow of things and leave the boat behind.”
Well, I was really happy with how this painting turned out, mostly because of the sky. I've been trying to work on my skies lately. I went to a show entitled "Great British Watercolours" a while back, at the art museum in Richmond. It was, as you'd expect if you know anything about British art, kind of boring in subject matter. But what the Brits lacked in interesting subjects they sure made up in technique! Wow, these watercolours were amazingly executed, particularly the skies. When I got home, I looked at some of my paintings and I realized I've been treating skies as space-filler, as empty space, where I ought to've been treating them as a major part of the piece of art itself. Does that make any sense? Mostly I realized that my skys are flat and boring, and lack flair and talent, and the degree of realism I'd like them to have (even if I paint in a bit of an impressionistic style). So I started working on my skies. I have a little watercolour moleskine that I'm slowly filling up with studies of the sky.
And this painting is the first "large" sky I've done since then, and I think it turned out quite well.
I'm sad, because I don't actually think I'll be able to use this for the book. Apparently, there's a scene in the third Pirates of the Caribbeans movie that looks just like this (makes me sorry I put the Jolly Roger on Confucius's boat, but I suppose that wouldn't make that much difference). So everyone will think I lifted the image straight out of the movie, and I haven't even seen it! More importantly, there's liable to be legal copy-right problems. But I like the sky, so i thought I'd post it here at least.
Maybe I'll do a new image of the perplexed repairman, trying to put the new tyre on the boat.
Confucius was driving through the desert when he got a flat tire. They had no spare, so his student called an auto mechanic from his cell phone. When the mechanic heard that it was none other than Confucius with a flat, he said, “Man, I really feel sorry for that guy.”
The student asked, “Is that because of the flat?”
The mechanic replied, “No, Confucius has far bigger problems than that!”
He explained, “Visiting a witchdoctor during the day could be a good idea, because he might give you some useful potions. Visiting a witchdoctor at night is just asking for trouble, because that's when they practice evil voodoo. What's more, if you invite a witchdoctor into your house to cast spells over your sleeping body, then chances are that you'll have quite a few nightmares. It seems to me that Confucius has invited a permanent witchdoctor into his home to cast spells over his disciples' sleeping bodies. The cursed master gets chased from city to city, not because he wants to travel, but because he wears out his welcome. Sometimes he goes without food, living on the verge of death! Isn't that some voodoo-inspired living nightmare?”
When the mechanic arrived with a tire, he exclaimed, “No wonder you don't have a spare: this is a boat! Although boats work wonders in water, it's super tough work to push them across land. It looks like Confucius is dragging the ideals of the past around like this heavy boat. No wonder he has so many problems! I'll tell you, each era and place has different properties for you to consider before you can freely move around in it. If you try to conform the era or place to your ideals, it'll be like pushing a boat across land: too much struggle with too little accomplishment. Instead of this tire, I'll offer you advise. Just go with the flow of things and leave the boat behind.”
Well, I was really happy with how this painting turned out, mostly because of the sky. I've been trying to work on my skies lately. I went to a show entitled "Great British Watercolours" a while back, at the art museum in Richmond. It was, as you'd expect if you know anything about British art, kind of boring in subject matter. But what the Brits lacked in interesting subjects they sure made up in technique! Wow, these watercolours were amazingly executed, particularly the skies. When I got home, I looked at some of my paintings and I realized I've been treating skies as space-filler, as empty space, where I ought to've been treating them as a major part of the piece of art itself. Does that make any sense? Mostly I realized that my skys are flat and boring, and lack flair and talent, and the degree of realism I'd like them to have (even if I paint in a bit of an impressionistic style). So I started working on my skies. I have a little watercolour moleskine that I'm slowly filling up with studies of the sky.
And this painting is the first "large" sky I've done since then, and I think it turned out quite well.
I'm sad, because I don't actually think I'll be able to use this for the book. Apparently, there's a scene in the third Pirates of the Caribbeans movie that looks just like this (makes me sorry I put the Jolly Roger on Confucius's boat, but I suppose that wouldn't make that much difference). So everyone will think I lifted the image straight out of the movie, and I haven't even seen it! More importantly, there's liable to be legal copy-right problems. But I like the sky, so i thought I'd post it here at least.
Maybe I'll do a new image of the perplexed repairman, trying to put the new tyre on the boat.