It was a simple little painting, nice if nothing especially original or fantastically crafted or anything startling like that, but I liked what I saw. It was of a slightly stylized, funny little semi-abstract bird, one of those paintings that always run the risk of being too cute and cuddly and charming for its own good, with a few little bitty splashes of the leftover paint sprinkled about the canvas almost as an afterthought, maybe meant to evoke flowers or stars. Not much to move me or even catch my attention . . . except . . .
No, this is not the painting. Not even part of it. I couldn't photograph someone else's artwork (this is mine, as always) and stick it in my blog even if I wanted to do so, because that would be (a) copyright infringement and (b) as ill-mannered as flying over someone and . . . well, you'll see . . .
I liked what I saw because that last little splash, those sprinkly spots–why, they landed smack in the empty space right beneath the birdie’s tail. All of a sudden a foofy little bird that seemed to have been meant to act all pert and prim . . . had pooped. In an eyeblink it went straight from being a prissy little pretty-bird vacant of all meaning to become a faintly twerpish chirper, a vaguely immature and irresponsible and a much, oh ever so much, more real and kindred-spirit creature. “I strafe upon you all!” it cheeped, but all the while with the same blandly friendly expression, almost as if it were a passive-aggressive scalawag of a bird just barely behind that pastel-feathered façade.
So much more understandable and filled with story-time potential, this impertinent little fellow. It’s not that I want to be that bronze-cast personage of the park whereon the pigeons land to ‘take their ease’–life offers plenty of opportunities for humans to feel they’re treated like inanimate objects or public restrooms as it is–it’s just that part of me is pleased that a little cutesy-bird was allowed to go his own way just for the element of surprise, that some painter I might’ve dismissed as boringly sugared-up with too-sweet birds decided, literally, to ‘let this one go’.
Even better to my mind, I’m afraid, is if that same artist never even noticed the obvious implication of that splotch’s placement and so sent out, for show and sale, a scamp of a bird that flicked its tail with devious disdain and dropped its pretty pastel bombs upon the painter’s cozy dainty reputation right along with all the passing world. I couldn’t help myself: I liked what I saw.
No, obviously this is not the painting in question either. In the interest of full disclosure, however, I will tell you that my original mixed media painting shown digitally here was titled ‘Ruach‘, a nice juicy Hebrew name meant to evoke the eponymous Holy Spirit. Which, being represented in the narratives generally by a much nicer (if not necessarily politer) sort of bird, would presumably drop kindlier sorts of things upon one in passing. I would hope. And hey, that just makes the earthly, earthy mischievousness of the bird in the other painting that much more amusingly charming by contrast. If you share my childish kind of humor, anyway.
Art-Colored Glasses 
I’m intrigued by the bird that you saw. I can almost picture it based off your description. Loved the humour of the ‘dots’ near the bird’s tail.
Your own paintings are bursting with feelings and emotions. I love how they’re not confined to a single shape or idea. They’re molded through different strokes. I like that.
Thank you very much, ‘Nessa.
Gosh it’s amazing how a few stray paint splashes can change the *meaning* of a painting. It’s amusing tale. You I surmise are keenly observant; I wonder if the painting’s purchaser noticed what the bird was up to.
One can only hope!!
Your artistic writings and renderings again amaze the humbled senses, dear KathrynIngrid…
. . . but I must thank the artist who painted the bird for giving me such excellent fodder! Meanwhile, very glad you like it. 🙂
Oh darling Kathryn, will you please post a link to this fantastical painting of the pooping bird? I simply MUST experience this myself, though the word pictures you have drawn have brought an image to life in my mind.
Believe me, if it were available for the linking, I would indeed have done so, but it’s a piece I saw for sale in a shop in, of all things, an airport. Oh, and in the middle of a long canceled-flight night, so I was too wuzzy to even note the artist’s name and look him/her up later. Sorry!
*wiping the tears of sorrow from my eyes* I suppose I will have to live with my mental image. sigh….. (I am sounding just like my mother when she is trying out the old guilt trip scenario, by the way)
Boy, am I glad that you have a mastery of word craft to give me such a vivid picture!
Oh i share your childish sense of humour! But really honey, if you want POOP.. well there is some mucking out to do when it thaws! Love the image of the naughty little birdie! c
I imagine that the painting could’ve looked more documentary than cute to you! (Except that I know your vivid imagination allows for more amusement than only that.) 😉
You are SO going to laugh at my post tomorrow…
Quite inappropriately, but we’ll know why. 😉
Oh, yes, now I *do* know why!! 😀 Hmm, who can explain, though, why the phrase “child-*rearing*” just popped into my naughty little head??
It’s a good thing that I wasn’t with you when you saw that Study in Whitewash. Surely the TSA would have been called to check out the hysterical pair walking about. Still, I cannot help but wonder who sells art in an airport and, more importantly, who would buy it? “Gee, Honey, we’ve got 15 minutes before our flight boards. Let’s see if we can find something that’ll match the new sofa.”
Hahaha! I’ve always been mystified by such shopping opportunities, too. One of my favorites is at SeaTac airport: a glass art shop. While I know that western Washington has some widely renowned glass artists and studios and schools, I’m seriously unclear on why they’d decide that an *airport* is a good place to promote that art! “Oh, yes, Mr. TSA Officer Sir, I’ll happily unearth that sharp pointy shardlike object for you to manhandle suspiciously, and let me help you jam it back into my carry-on luggage as I prepare to fling it into a too-small overhead rack to complete the re-granulization process whilst en route home.”
Yes, share that sense of humour too! I loved this post both for your beautiful paintings and the wonderful way you craft your words to conjure up images. Lovely!
Thank you very much, Tanya, I enjoy those moments when a topic just hands itself to me like that (or should I say, drops on my head?). 😉
I like to think of it as childlike sense of humor – laughing at the beautiful incongruities of life and that emperor who keeps walking around without any clothes on. I love the picture, Ruach; there’s a fierceness in that beauty.
Thank you, my sweet. I’m glad you got out of Ruach what I was trying to feed into it. That doesn’t always happen!
This reminds me of Nigel, the bad-guy cockatoo in the children’s movie “Rio”. He poops on people and blames it on the seagulls! =D
I see that my research is incomplete: I shall have to see ‘Rio’! Not that Nigel would remind us of any *human* sorts anyone might know!! 😉