C.light part 2 chapter 25
Al was free of anxiety and as usual elevated after the escape. Now he saw the man he assumed being too well informed non-threatening āYouāre looking at my painting but I know you plan to destroy this place.ā
Ā Ā Ā The man grinned, āAl, your art is so luminous I could stare at Euphoria and forget all.ā
Ā Ā Ā āThank you! Still I know you want this place down. How about my art?ā
Ā Ā Ā āSince you mention it I certainly call it of and your art is safe here.ā
Ā Ā Ā āGreatly appreciated,ā Al had no more bad feeling about his new friend whose name he knew without ever being introduced. āMay I call you Joshua?ā
Ā Ā Ā āOf course Al, call me Josh.ā
Ā Ā Ā āI have few questions, Josh.ā
Ā Ā Ā The man no longer seemed weird unlike the first impression. Josh was someone Al liked among a world of people he didnāt. Lately the artist noticed how the universe around him suddenly shrinks and heās alone in the void, loosing his natural life-long friendliness to environment. He functioned the same going to play tennis three times a week for long 5 hours sets, going for the long strides in the city with camera doing sometimes 10 hours footwork with not a gulp of water or a bite of food or a cigarette completely absorbed in the hunt for image he wanted to add to his collection. If he saw it heād takeĀ
about 500 shots of the spot with his digital camera then come back home to sort out his data choosing the images to keep until the idea ripens and he knows how to put together a picture superimposing previously collected images to the scene. The process was complicated exhausting but in the end if he liked the created picture it was as good as painting. He created reality not something that existed in the world except by his design. And digital media made it look real.
Ā Ā Ā Something changed since he stopped painting. The lifeline was severed, he betrayed his religion and it made him unwell. Digital photography was a compromise? He thought of it as cheating though the works he made were hardly less creative less exciting.
Ā Ā Ā Josh was old-fashioned Al thought being so in love with his painting. But Josh knew things Al was trying to understand for as long as he remembered, about creation of the world, meaning of life and so on.
Ā Ā Ā āI like your painting Al for a reason that they never stop changing when I try to understand them. Like life and universe.ā
Ā Ā Ā āJosh, what do you think is meaning of all that?ā Al made a hand wave outward.
Ā Ā Ā āWhatever you can imagine exists somewhere Al, otherwise how can it be imagined? If your mind creates it then its reality maybe far far away.ā
Ā Ā Ā āNever thought of it like that,ā Al contemplated the idea with a slight smile visiting his face.
Ā Ā Ā āFor some people there is not much to imagine. For you its infinity of universes you can bare while some would crack up having a fraction of what is stored in your head.ā
Ā Ā Ā āI think my time had come for cracking up. You figured I stopped messing with oil.ā
Ā Ā Ā Josh came close to Euphoria, āI know there is something underneath the painting, a completely different start.ā
Ā Ā Ā āHow do you know? Itās covered nobody could see it?ā
Ā Ā Ā āI was there when it happened.ā
Ā Ā Ā āWhere? In Dallas, you were my neighbor? How is it possible my windows overlooked a highway? There was a building across the road. Did you live there?ā
Ā Ā Ā āI was with you in the room when you painted.ā
Ā Ā Ā Al closed eyes for a second, āYou were a woman? You donāt look like the type. And she wasnāt in the studio when I worked anyway.ā
Ā Ā Ā āAl, forget it. Donāt matter really. I wonder did that unsuccessful drawing affected Euphoria?ā
Ā Ā Ā āI was frustrated that the canvas I prepared by hand was wasted. Next day I saw something in the spills of that green washes. I canāt even understand how I did it or who was leading my hand, like I wasnāt in charge of this work as if under hypnosis. Working non-stopā¦ā
Ā Ā Ā āIts amazing since this is such a large picture how you painted it in one day.ā
Ā Ā Ā āSee, you werenāt really there. I couldnāt finish it and came back to it next day. That was the hardest as usual.ā
Ā Ā Ā āThere was not much for you to finish, ninety percent of the painting was already executed.ā
Ā Ā Ā āI never thought of it like that. Still ten percent of wrong color and tone can kill the work. So no matter how much there is left to do the next day itās always a killer. Not to destroy the freshness, to hold the composition and tonal range.ā
Ā Ā Ā āI wish I could paint!ā said Josh dreamy.
Ā Ā Ā āBeing a hypnotist like you must be interesting!ā
Ā Ā Ā āWe are reading each other, I am learning from you and otherwise. You knew about my thoughts of this clinic? I heard how Robert accused Dr. Stern for his adherence to the medical establishment that allows doctors hook their patients on drugs. This is first time in history of humanity when such practice overwhelms any reason.ā
Ā Ā Ā āDid you ever try drugs?ā
Ā Ā Ā Josh was thinking to say, āI drink wine and feel elation at some point. Thing is, human mind had changed so much that it thinks constant elation must be a norm of life. Constant overflow of energy is survival technique. There is no such concept as moderation in anything anymore. People lost sense of limits. I really donāt know how it supposed to evolve. Morals, politics, social condition all are in a state of hysteria. Do you think major war is a solution?ā
Ā Ā Ā āHistorically war always happened when decadence takes over. But I like the words ālife will find the way.āā
Ā Ā Ā āIf you knew of my personal involvement in decision making for the next stage of evolution and see how much panic I endure I bet youād suggest I start seeing Dr. Stern and succumb to the traditional treatment,ā smiled Josh however his face now was so much different from when he was fixed on the favorite painting and issues of Alās creation. He seemed lost and depressed. āI know these doctors are here to help people in their suffering. Doctors are so much like me dealing with those who need help. But do you think that illness of mind is something that can be cured surgically or with pills?ā
Ā Ā Ā āNo, I think as long as there is too much people who canāt be settled in life and find something to do the idleness will bring the so-called mental epidemic.ā
Ā Ā Ā āThen war is inevitable to eradicate all the surplus population.ā
Ā Ā Ā āWar nowadays can turn ugly and kill us all. This is not your 20th century tryout, Josh. This it the time for the final battle.ā
Ā Ā Ā āThatās another side of the coin. No can do. Then a bird flu pandemic?ā
Ā Ā Ā āIf I was a God I would try to keep only those people whose life is worth something. It sounds genocidal but as we discussed with you the time is changing drastically, things that were evil before could be now the only way.ā
Ā Ā Ā āSo you say there must be a disease that discriminates people of no merit. How one comes up with such a cure?ā
Ā Ā Ā āFunny you calling it cure.ā
Ā Ā Ā āMaybe we can design this cure together, Al. You always were inventive.ā
Ā Ā Ā āOnly God could undertake this major challenge.ā
Ā Ā Ā āGod is not exactly universal in finding right paths. He looks at those few creative men learning how to get ahead of the game. If we show the model of improvement to this declining world it will probably come to his attention.ā
Ā Ā Ā Al had a fleeting thought to ask Josh if he could draw his portrait to react his todayās dream.
Looking at Josh from the artistic point he thought the manās face and build was hardly memorable when he wasnāt in his stage costume. For a portrait Al would never choose such a model, he was interested in faces that map life and show emotion, a weathered homeless man be a better portrait model then Josh. Al would have to add some of his usual puzzle symbols to make this face stand out.Ā
What Josh just said was more then peculiar and didnāt go well with his appearance of affable demeanor. As in the dream God was turning Death. There, he thought this is exactly how I can draw his image a laid-back friend who is torn apart by his true nature of not so simple mind.
āJosh would you mind if I draw your portrait?ā asked Al almost knowing the positive answer but negative thoughts it evoked in Josh. āWe need to go to my room, Iāve got my ballĀ
point pen and a sketch book there. It wouldnāt take more then thirty minutes.ā So they went.
Later that day Sam was finally in control of the situation. Stern stoically stayed until finally hearing the friendās hollers. Sam only mentioned to Stern who was on his way out āWe must decide further steps since I will break the artistās circuit, Sarahās already unplugged, itās time for the cop. I need to upgrade the system since this was a warning, something overlooked.ā
Al opened a chest drawer with socks and underwear where he knew he had also a drawing album. He was not interested in anyone here even though Iris offered to pose nude.
Ā Ā Ā Josh waited by the window.
Ā Ā Ā Al to keep his mind away from the eternal question why drawing anything so banal as human face said, āItās pretty amazing what you do Josh, you are a great hypnotist if I am not mistaken. You penetrated into my dreams today?ā
Ā Ā Ā āYour dreams are as complicated as your art.ā
Ā Ā Ā āTrue, but how dreams originate?ā
Ā Ā Ā āQuite simple, if itās an normal person. Yet again, with you I canāt quite understand. How your mind produces a dream with uninterrupted elaborate scenario so surreal butĀ
consistent and prolonged.ā
Ā Ā Ā āI wish I wrote down many of them. I could write a horror movie scrip out of each,ā Al laughed, āfor some reason I am always chased by the sadistic monsters.ā
Ā Ā Ā āWouldnāt Dr. Stern call it a post-traumatic nightmares?ā
Ā Ā Ā āHe always does. Do you agree with this bullshit?ā
Ā Ā Ā āI thought so. Someone said giving a disease a name doesnāt help to cure it. The whole system is based on a wall of bureaucracy. The further it goes the more paperwork and words. Harvesting for more catchy clichĆ©s.ā
Ā Ā Ā āAl I look in the sky and everything is in agreement, I look down and things turn chaotic. Was it all a mistake?ā
Ā Ā Ā āRather a big joke,ā answered Al and sensed how he no longer cared, he was free of philosophical depression. āYour hypnosis really works, Josh. On other occasion just the thought of existential crisis would give me hours of darkness.ā
Ā Ā Ā āWill you return to painting?ā asked Josh, āyou will never be sick again.ā
Ā Ā Ā āThatās to be seen. I might quit the digital crap and paint. I always wanted to continue but lost the sense ofĀ
purpose. I no longer understood why am I painting? When I started taking pictures of the city streets my reason was simply to get out for fresh air. Otherwise I wouldnāt even come out.ā
Ā Ā Ā Al observed a slight change of expression on Joshās face and commented. āI guess I can read what you think now, how this was a pathetic excuse to renounce art.ā
Ā Ā Ā āNo any work by you is a masterpiece.ā
Ā Ā Ā āThanks but all my paintings need to be redone. I am constantly growing even while working with photos and could see mistakes in my painting. It would be interesting to paint after such long break. I donāt even know if I can?ā
Ā Ā Ā āYou can since this came to you with your motherās milk.ā
Ā Ā Ā āWhat do you think about this picture?ā asked Al showing Josh a symbolic portrait. Josh got up and took the paper and instead of commenting on the allegory he praised, āYou are such a master of line, Al. Itās most flowing gracious line known in art. It has so many differences in its thickness character and pronunciation. This is why I can look at your works forever as there is always so many variations in every little part, and you are doing it without much thought or preparation just on a whim of your geniusā¦āĀ
āWow, wow Josh. You sound like an art critic. People who say these things about my art are usually opinionated in my favor. I always thought female critics say that being interested in me as a man.ā
Ā Ā Ā āI know you too well for such discourse. What woman can tolerate you for too long? You are hard.ā
Ā Ā Ā āYou mean I am an asshole?ā laughed Al. Josh looked at the picture saying, āItās a portrayal of someone as much problematical.ā It was getting late and Al asked his guest if he was hungry. Then the two went to get few bites where they met Agnelli.
areudirty
origamiaround
theartofmadeline
dededos
turnnoffyourmind
gummygunk
blakekathryn
