Paul Gauguin was arguably a "self-invented figure, but a kind of impostor, uncomfortable in his own skin, running towards an idea of an untainted world, but also running away from career and personal difficulties."
No one can fully determine whether or not the places he ran away to were real or imagined--wishful fantasies of unadulterated and unexplored lands that seeped sensuality. Artists tend to be good at painting a picture of reality that, depending on the theme, is so much better (and sexier) than reality.
Without even looking at one of his many rich paintings, I know where my own mind takes me. Maybe it's a typical artist's inclination to yearn for a place unknown. A place outside modernization and affluence. A place--naked and raw--to escape to.
That's what art and literature are for, right? I've had numerous discussions about paintings and books that have consumed me and left me wanting more. I hold them tightly to my body after reading sentences and paragraphs that make me ache with desperation to exist in their words. I want to eat them. Literally cut the book into bite-sized pieces and eat each one slowly and carnivorously, like, if I swallow it up, the feeling will dwell in me and become a part of me.
I often look at paintings in the same vain. Wishing I could dive into the colors, lay in their warmth, feel the skin of the subjects, and simply be there in that moment. I lose myself in this moment until I hear the swoosh of a camera phone. I'm in a museum and now I'm irritated by the world again. The fields and mangoes are all fake and I'm not naked, lounging in the grass. I'm in jeans and my phone has unread messages about parties and dinners where I will drink enough to forget about this painting and that book that had, for a brief moment, taken me from this world.
"The disillusioned drink," my dear my friend Jonathan told me.
Maybe that explains why so many good people and artists do drink. They see the world for what it is and more importantly, for what it's not and that truth is harsh. The examined life is beautiful but the more you learn, the more you see. The blinders come off as does the illusion that adults are perfect, truth always wins, and Santa Claus exists.
To hell with that! So paint something, write something, create the world you wish existed and fall in love again. Hemingway was right, we are fools to do so but there is nothing left but to be a fool.
And I am a fool searching, trying to write my own paradise--the place that exists in my head because the world in my mind is so much better than the real world.
One of my favorite films is A Love Song for Bobby Long and in it, the character Pursy says to Bobby, "Everyone knows that books are better than life! That's why they're books!"
Does that place exist? The place we dream and read about? In today's modern world, is such a place even possible? And in homage to the surrealists, can a realistic painting replace the actual thing? Can a painting of an apple be so realistic that it can replace a real apple (besides eating it of course)? If so, we could find ourselves in some very strange Stepford Wives-type world but you see what I mean? Can something we create in our heads to be so real and life-like that we believe it to be true?
Is Tahiti just a thought away?
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| René Magritte, “The Promenades of Euclid” (1955) |
Not to say life--reality--isn't beautiful and romantic and strange. But why do we fight it so much? Why is the "grass always greener"? They envy me and I envy them and so on and so forth.
It isn't surprising (and didn't know it until I began writing this post) that Paul Gauguin Tahiti cruises exist. Type "Paul Gauguin Tahiti" in a Google search and it's the first thing on the page. I wonder what Paul would think of that, considering he escaped to Tahiti in order to get away from the spiritually constipated western world.
For now, I think the ticket to paradise is embracing the madness of it all.
God grant me the serenity to accept reality for what it is, the courage to dream, and the wisdom to know the difference.
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