oil pencil, watercolor, and pastel
5″x7″
2014
Well, yesterday’s very small landscape wasn’t, after all, the “last” picture I’ve done for the Fall Studio Tour. I came across this picture (which I began last Summer) last night. Today?…. I patiently/irritatedly set out the pastels, pencils, and brushes...KNOWING full-well that I was going to have to spend at least two hours “on-hold” while I waited to speak to actual humans from Wells Fargo, American Express, Home Depot, Duke Medical,and Century Link telephone repair-service. All were very long waits……so I just drew and painted while I cradled the telephone between my ear and my shoulder.
It just occurred to me that this is the only picture I’ve ever done to the accompaniment of Muzak.
In any case, it’s small, and it’s a re-working of a crudely-done picture from fifteen years ago, and the quotation is from Albert Einstein (circa 1957). As for the translation?…..it’s my translation of the inscription on a postcard sent to me by Herve’s
(French, need I emphasize?) mother (“Un homme qui n’est plus capable de s’emerveiller a pratiquement cesse de vivre”).
I went a-googling and found (as far as I can tell) that the original German quotation is about fifteen times the length of the English or French translations. Why does that not come as a surprise to me?…..
That said?…..the relievedly-brief English translation (and the key to this puzzle-picture) is “The man who has ceased to wonder has practically ceased to exist”.