The Painted Nut, part three

If ever there was a decision to be made, he would have made it years ago, but, in his present occupation, he chooses only colors—he mixes them directly on the shell of whatever nut he is painting and has never felt his subjects being generated by him or allotted to him. His tools are tiny paintbrushes equipped with stiff synthetic animal hairs, some with only two hairs and some with no more than five. The color choices he makes are completely arbitrary and depend on his intention and the surface of the shell: the initial premises of his work revolve around grand, implausible schemes of interpretation that endeavor to wring spirituality out of miniature, flaccid representations of nature in unreal colors and distorted compositions. The darker hues he gingerly dabs into the ruts and grooves of the surface then, switching brushes, he strokes the lighter shades on the raised ribs. On every nut he attempts to deflate the unique topography of the shell and disclose a church spire surrounded by cypress trees or a garden scene complete with shallow brook and a variety of flowers or the striking portrait of a heavy brick palazzo or the shady rendering of race horses or fantastic and grotesquely colored upended baskets of fruit in impossible arrangements with wine bottles, teapots, serving dishes and candlesticks, and each time he paints, he fails. The painted grooves and ribs form a rhythmic clutter and the garish colors enhance the off kilter melody with a dissonance that cannot be blamed solely on the rhythm. The spirituality he requests from his paint is only a shade in the back of his mind. Like the shadow his crouched form creates when he awakes, it is only a cast, an immaterial presence the existence of which depends entirely on one physical form blocking the flow of an insubstantial energy.

If another person was present as an observer and she had the presence of mind to inquire about his progress he might only raise his head slightly, mumble a little and wave his hand, but it will not occur to him that he is performing a task—let alone working on a particular project or even producing anything. His head then droops again and he reloads his brush. Visualizing a lonely and vacant country road lined with apple trees, he dribbles ochre streaks over a blue field and the minutia tightly draws him in, leaving him with no impression of his surroundings, his stool and table, or the light that shines daily, or the kind of nut he is painting, or even the unexplained appearance and departure of an observer.