Tried for an Art Break from Society's Ruin

November Blog

I’m going to write a little bit about arts and crafts (the hobby, not the period of art design) because I’m just fed up with ranting about the depravity, phoniness, self destructiveness and meanness of people and societal structures today.

Hobby Lobby had a sale that included colored pencils and pastels, so I stocked up. I’ve just started using pastels, but I am a long time colored pencil affectionato. After some initial trepidation I’ve become thrilled with pastels. I bought several sets. When I opened the Rembrandt brand pastels I was delighted not only with the color palette but also that each of the thirty pastels comes wrapped in a translucent Rembrandt wrapper. I always use packaging and scrap paper in my art work (a trademark from my collage work) so I immediately had an idea. I went to Dollar Tree and found a wood frame, a warm teak color, about 6 x 8 size (for a 4 x 6 picture exposed area). The frame is about 1.25 inches wide around. It was on sale no less, so I paid $0.27 for it. Yesterday I slit lengthwise each Rembrandt wrapper on the opposite side of where the name runs lengthwise and removed each from the pastel. I trimmed each wrapper to include the “Rembrandt” followed by their trademark symbol, plus enough width along the top to carry along with it some of the dust color from the pastel. I then glued (using Elmer’s Glue) all thirty labels to cover the frame surface. The thirty labels ended up being a perfect fit for covering the entire front of the wooden frame plus the top and two sides. As I moistened each wrapper back with the glue I made sure to smear around the back any of the pastel color that came along with the wrapper. This color now shows through the translucent wrappers to give a subtle tint of the pastel itself. Once the frame dried I added a protective layer of Elmer’s Glue over all the labels by applying thin lines especially along the seams from wrapper to wrapper and then hand rubbing it evenly using my finger. Elmer’s Glue was the first poor man’s decoupage sealant and I still prefer it. It dries very soft and smooth yet non sticky and is much less toxic than chemical sealants.

I then needed a Rembrandt picture to put in the frame. My art books are in storage and I’m not near the usual arty sources, so I made a copy from my Saints book of Rembrandt’s “Saint Matthew Inspired by the Angel” (1661, Louvre, Paris) and used that. It looks great! It’s almost the perfect size for the frame. I made need to experiment to get a better copy on my copier (my printer is not working as a printer so I’m forced to just do traditional copying) since I have glare plus some irritating white margin, but my theory of what would be a really cool craft designed around the theme of Rembrandt worked out in that satisfying way (where what an artist envisions actually delivers as imagined). It’s sitting on my table next to this laptop computer now.

On the subject of phoniness I had the idea for an oil painting today. I’m not a figural painter so I just come up with the ideas and unless I find collage materials that match my idea I don’t actually paint the painting, just imagine it in my mind. I imagined a painting where I am standing to the right side of the canvas. In the middle facing me are all the people I know who are poseurs and pretending to be someone they are not, or hiding information from me, and or spying. That is represented by the people wearing masks and costumes, but they are all disguised only on the side facing me. Behind them, viewing their true selves, unmasked and uncovered with poseur clothes stands God the Father. They do not see him because they are all interested in “faking me out” so they are absorbed in facing me. I imagine in this painting God the Father reaching out to tap on the shoulder of the nearest poseur and clearing his throat with an “Ah-hem” kind of cough. He sees their real butts and back of their heads in other words ha. Because see, this is what really happens. It’s an important allegorical painting that shows what really happens when a person works to deceive or manipulate another. While you are dressing up in your mask and poseur costume and rehearsing your script lines, God is always there and sees all, knows all. He is standing right behind everyone all the time and knows and sees their not very charitable and in fact, their cruel and sinning selves even as the person thinks they are undetected. I’ve written about this before but doing spying and scripted activities to manipulate a person are mortal sins as they break two of the Ten Commandments.

Commandment Eight says that “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.” When a person misrepresents themselves to another person they are effectively bearing false witness, because they are putting the person in a dishonestly gained disadvantage in order to exploit them. This leads to the second violated Commandment, which is Ten that “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s goods.” If you are posing and manipulating a person you are doing so out of envy of who they are and what they have (even if it is abstract what they have, which is peace of mind and fairness.) By the way, by violating Commandments Eight and Ten in this way you are also violating the First Commandment, “I am the Lord Thy God; thou shalt not have strange gods before Me.” This is because if you are a poseur and a manipulator you are putting your interests ahead of God’s direct commandments toward neighbor, charity and truthfulness on this subject. I am amazed how stupid, dishonorable and venial (as in debased, not as in lesser gravity of sin) so many in Western society have become, and certainly nearly everyone I know. How stupid are people who rehearse doing hurtful things to me (and to others) and think that is a secret? The Bible repeatedly warns that NOTHING is secret from God. You don’t think God is watching when people plan their lines, writing up their liner cards, setting up the manipulative event of me, or the other person. Hell, I’m usually aware of it, so how can any idiot think that God doesn’t see each and every event? I think this painting would be informative for anyone who’s IQ is better than a head of cabbage and should give a hint of their fallen state of grace that they will have to answer for to God personally.