Chapter 17 "Istanbul" The Joy of Painting

Not long after I started school, I discovered the joy of drawing.Perhaps it is incorrect to use "discovery", which implies something to be discovered, like a new continent.If there is a love and talent for painting hidden in my heart, it was only after I went to school that I realized it.It would be more correct to say that I paint because it makes me carefree.My talent for drawing came later, not at first. Maybe I'm really talented, but that's not the point.I just found that drawing makes me happy, and that's what matters. One night, many years later, I asked my father how they knew I had an artistic talent. "You drew a tree," he told me, "and you drew a crow on a branch. Your mother and I looked at each other because that's how a real crow perched on a branch."

While this doesn't quite answer my question, and it may not be true, I like the story and am happy to believe it.It's likely that my drawing of a crow wasn't particularly successful for a seven-year-old boy.Clearly, the ever-optimistic, overconfident father had a knack for believing in his heart that everything his son did was great.This insight was contagious, and I began to think of myself as artistically gifted. The compliments I get for drawing make me think I've got a machine that makes people have to love me, kiss me, and adore me.So whenever I feel bored, I turn on the machine and drive out a few pictures.They kept buying me paper and pencils, and I kept drawing, and when it was my turn to show off the drawings, my father was my first choice.He always gave me the response I'd hoped for, first looking at the drawing in wonder and admiration—which often took my breath away—and then interpreting it: "Look at how well you drew the fisherman standing. He's in a bad mood, the sea is so dark. Standing next to him must be his son. The fish and birds look like they're waiting too. So smart."

I ran in and drew another one.The boy next to the fisherman is supposed to be his friend, but I made him a little too small.But at this point I already know how to accept compliments.I showed the painting to my mother and said: "Look what I drew. The fisherman and his son." "Nice drawing, honey," said the mother, "but did you do your homework?" After I drew a picture at school one day, everyone gathered around me to look at it.Teacher Baoya even hung the painting on the wall.I feel like a magician who pulls rabbits and doves out of his sleeve - I just have to draw these wonders, show them off, and earn compliments.

At this time, my skills are becoming more and more proficient, and I can be called talented.I paid close attention to the simple line drawings in textbooks, comic books, and newspaper cartoons, paying attention to how to draw houses, trees, and standing people.My paintings are not sketches: I draw pictures I see elsewhere and memorize them by heart.A picture that I can remember for a long time so that I can reproduce it has to be simple.Oil painting and photography are too complicated for me.I like coloring books, and I went to Aladdin's store with my mother to buy new books, not for coloring, but for studying the pictures and drawing them myself.Once I draw a house, a tree or a street, these things stay in my memory.

I draw a tree, a tree standing alone and alone.Draw the branches and leaves as quickly as possible, followed by the mountains seen between them.I draw a tall mountain or two behind the foliage, and then—inspired by Japanese paintings I've seen—a taller, more dramatic mountain behind those mountains.My hands now have a will of their own.The clouds and birds I drew looked just like the ones I had seen in other paintings.After finishing one, I came to the most exciting part: on the top of the highest mountain in the background, I painted the snow. I stare proudly at my creation, bobbing my head from side to side, poring over the details, then stand back and take a full look.Yes, I drew this beautiful thing.Yes, it's not perfect, but it's always me, and it's beautiful.Painting is a kind of pleasure, and it is also a pleasure to pretend to be another person to admire my paintings from a distance at this moment from the window.

But sometimes when I look at my paintings through other people's eyes, I notice certain flaws.Otherwise, there is a strong urge to continue the pleasure I enjoy while painting it.The quickest thing to do is to add a cloud, a few birds, a leaf. Later, I sometimes felt that these further retouches ruined my painting.But there's no denying that these touch-ups bring me back to the original creative bliss, so I can't stop myself. What pleasure does drawing give me? Here, you fifty-year-old memoirist, put yourself at a distance from himself as a child: 1. I enjoy painting because painting allows me to create instant miracles and amaze the people around me.Long before the painting is finished, I expect that my painting will be praised and loved.As anticipation deepens, anticipation becomes part of the creation itself, and part of the joy of creation.

2. After a period of time, my hands became as skillful as my eyes.Therefore, when I draw a detailed tree, I feel that my hand moves without listening to it.Seeing the pencil flying on the paper, I watched in amazement, as if the drawing proved the existence of another thing, as if another person had entered my body.Just as I was amazed at his works and longed to be equal to him in strength, another part of my head was also busy examining the curves of the branches, the configuration of the mountains, and the overall composition, thinking that this scene was drawn by me on white paper.My mind is on the tip of the pen, action precedes thinking, but at the same time I can examine what I have already drawn.This second perception, this ability to analyze my progress, was the joy the little artist felt as he watched his discovery of courage and freedom.To step out of myself and to know another person who has entered my body is to redraw the dividing lines that appear when the pencil slides across the paper, like a boy sledding in the snow.

3. The divergence between my brain and my hand, the feeling of my hand moving by itself, has something in common with the feeling of hiding in a dream when my head is still.But—unlike the fantasies of my strange dreams—my pictures were not to be kept secret, but were shown to everyone, anticipating admiration.Painting is to find the existence of the second world without embarrassment. 4. The things I draw, no matter how illusory the houses, trees, and clouds are, have the basis of material reality.If I draw a house, it feels like it is my house.I feel like everything I paint belongs to me.To explore the world, to live among the trees and landscapes I draw, to paint a real world for others to see, is to escape from the dullness in front of me.

5. I love the smell and look of paper, pencils, sketchbooks, oil paints, and other art supplies.I like to stroke the blank drawing paper.I like to preserve my paintings, I like their "thingness", their material existence. 6. Discovering all these little pleasures, and with all the admiration I get, I dare to believe that I am different and talented.I don't like to boast about myself, but I do want others to know.The world I create through painting, like a second world I hide in my head, enriches my life.More importantly, drawing was a legitimate escape from the gray world of everyday life: my family accepted not only my new hobby, but my entitlement.