After a week-end filled with encounters which, at best, fall under the categories ‘new’, ‘weird’, ‘puzzling’, ‘almost frustrating if it weren’t for my frolicking friends and the miraculous effect of the Absolut’, Picasso’s exhibition seemed like the most appropriate finale to an overwhelmingly confusing break.Enjoying my ride to the capital in the passenger seat for a change, I was secretly hoping to see 'it' –my painting of an earlier post. Years later, heartbreaks seem to be a re-current theme in my life, differences lying in the details, faces, locations, etc.
I didn’t find it … Instead, I was mesmerized by her: her face or should I say her faces -profile and full face; her eyes -one looking out and another within ... 'her', so feminine, present, sophisticated, social, alive yet so soft, pensive, thoughtful, reflective, lonely …
There I was, contemplating the reflection of my own self wondering whether she too struggled between the face she had to show to the world and the face she wished she could reveal. Did she have days where she was tired of portraying the joyful, fun, daring, non-chalant, cool, detached, confident side of her. Did she ever feel like shouting out her over-sensitive, hopeless romantic, passionate, hesitant, protective, self-critical and reflective side? Did she ever overcome that fear of exposing what fully makes her up? How long did she have to nurture one side on the expense of the other for survival and company?
A text message from L woke me up to let me know that they had been waiting outside for quite some time. I looked back smiling, thinking that most probably Pablo had something different in mind. But hey, wasn’t he the one who said ‘It is not up to the painter to define the symbols otherwise it would be better if he wrote them out in so many words! The public who look at the picture must interpret the symbols as they understand them’?
Ah and so I obliged ;)
Painting: Portrait Dora Maar by Picasso - 1937