artWas trying to make some sketches on the DIY accessories project with Carrie and Kei, while listening to some of my CD collection as usual. I looked up and saw that little post-it reminding me of my aspiration of being an Art Therapist and besides the tiny post-it in blue is a photo of Soler.
And suddenly the quote from Dino in an interview months ago come up in my mind.
He said something like, "e.A.R.T.h. Art is a way for earthlings to reach heaven"
Didn't realize this quote can be applied to me until recently, I've rediscovered my passion towards Art.
My "relationship" with Art is kind of weird, and well perhaps, I should say, like a long-distance romance. Art is like a long-distant lover to me, far far far away from me yet close to my heart. I love drawing since I was a little kid. I remembered swirling my color pencils on the blank pages of my bro's left-over sketch book when I was in kindergarten. I loved drawing those big-eye girls in Japanese comics, in fact, I made my own comics...ha I said it's a long-distance relationship with Art because I've never really done serious courses on drawing, I took it as a past-time, not as a hobby. I never really went to formal classes to learn about the official drawing techniques. It feels like, I was familiar with Art yet I dun really know about Art. Close yet remote.
Things had been going well with my "childhood friend" until he flew to America...well I mean Art instead of "he". Anyway, reinforced by the good grades in Art from my primary to junior high years, I decided to take Visual Art when I was in F.4, despite the fact that people kept telling me that you'll never ever get a good grade in CE for the subject. Well I had that idealistic Christy in me and went for the subject anyway, in fact I thought that taking Visual Art in F.4 and 5 could lead me to the road of jewelery design.
And that's the point when my long-distance relationship arrived on the verge of a break-up. I hated drawing, because I had to go to the CE drilling classes after school to practice still-life drawing for hours. And people were so competitive, I was literally the least brilliant student in the class when all my classmates had already possessed those techniques. I started to skip those tiring classes, and eventually I've got a D in Art in CE (though the most brilliant classmate has got a D as well, well you never get what the people at Exam Authority thinks, plus those who were rating the Art exam may be artists themselves and they're "unpredictable"). I swore that I would never ever do still-life drawing again and locked all my drawing pencils into the drawer.
I kept to my pact. I didn't really get to draw when I went up to F.6 and 7.
Not until when I took the Fine Art courses in the first semester of my first year in the university did I rediscovered that the relationship can be saved.
Well Fine Art is not like Visual Art, in fact, doing Fine Art to me, is more like doing Eng. Lit when I was in F.6 and 7, with the materials changed from literature to art work. You have to relate the piece of Art to its historical context, and analyze its significance.
And doing this course, Art and Society, has renewed my passion towards Art again. I realized that I never really like producing Art myself, I love looking at Art. Whenever I look at a piece of Art, I feel like I'm communicating with the artist, and what I've got from the piece is exclusive, because everyone has different mindsets, and so they come up with different kinds of communication with the piece of Art, and finally a unique feeling towards the piece.
In the midst of the Art and Society course, I recounted what had happen to this long-distance relationship, why would I distance myself from Art emotionally? Isn't looking at Art just the same as my favourite part of Eng.Lit, reading literature, watching a movie, listening to a song? And aren't movies, literature and music just Art? To me, Art's anything that can provoke a feeling and a reflection on anything.
And by then I realized, Art has actually never left my life. It's all around. I've been restricting myself to the narrow definiton of Art. To do Art, meant to draw and to paint on the canvas for me in the past, but now I know, to do Art, is simply to appreciate.
To appreciate the beauty in everything. That little yellow butterfly that flies by can be Art, if it makes you happy, if its dances around that daisy is beautiful to you. That hand-made necklace of your friend can be an Art, if you're amazed at how she can make it in just one hour yet looks like she's bought it from an expensive brand-name store. Soler's Eastern Skies is a piece of Art, if you're moved by Dino's lyrics to tears. The covers of 亦舒's novels are Art, if by the simple figures, you can get what the whole story is about...
Once I've discovered the beauty in everything, like Dino said, I think I'm a baby-step closer to heaven, coz I feel happy, I feel fulfilled, I feel like the world's a beautiful place to be in, and isn't it just the definition of heaven? Somewhere full of beauty and happiness.
And my path seems to have cleared up. I know my relationship with Art has turned into an intimate intense passionate romance. I'm gonna do Art, I'm gonna stay with Fine Arts next year, and I'm gonna do something related to Art after graduation, and yea, I wanna become an Art Therapist, combining Art with another subject that I love, Psychology, and make a tiny difference to people's life by telling them how Art can be therapeutic by translating your emotions into Art, and through the translation, you discover yourself, that real inner self of yours.
Art makes me happy, and anyone who makes you happy is a good lover. So I'm gonna stick to him for real. Hahaha.
