A BUSY DAY
Last Sunday was an open day Winter Gathering at Montsalvat and Angela, Adam and I painted in the studio as the general public filed through, inspected our work and chatted to us. It was a very enjoyable experience to re-acquaint with old friends and make new ones albeit briefly.
It is amazing how many of our visitors said that they wished that they could paint. The obvious reply would be ‘well why don’t you’ but I generally reply that I guess there are things that you can do that I cant.
It takes me to a time on the north side of Mount Macedon where I was painting by the roadside on a beautiful morning. The view is a spectacular one and I was doing a reasonable job when a very large livestock truck came down the hill and with a loud hiss of the air brakes pulled up behind me. A large man in a blue singlet, stubbie shorts and heavy boots dropped out of the cab and approached me.
I have always been partial to the perfume of dust and diesel on a sunny morning. This truck was a big one and the driver’s first words were ‘I wish I could paint like that!’ My reply of course was that I wished that i could drive like he could. This seemed to satisfy him as he said, ‘ I’ve never thought of my job in that way.’ and so we set to chatting about how peoples various skills make the world go round.
Many of the visitors on Sunday considered their particular skills whilst talking to me and I learned as much about them as they did about me. I find human beings fascinating both from a visual and an intellectual point of view. I encountered people from aged to babes in arms and really enjoyed the interaction.
I look forward to doing it it again in July at the Winter Gathering.
Counting Stitches
Don James Art 