Continuous Ambiguous

This is a blog named after a painting. You haven’t seen it.

Inside sits a faded, grayscale old man, looking out of a window-- looking somewhat sad, somewhat numb, with his frown held in an ambiguous counterpart to Mona Lisa's smile. And all around him spiral arcs of solid, glowing color: reds, yellows, greens, and more.  Eel-like, they stream from the wall, from furniture, from his clothing; they loop around him, brush against him, and tunnel through the window.

What struck me was how oblivious that grey old man was. Those strange ribbons invading his mono-color world: did he not see them, for his reverie of the window? Did he not feel them, as they touched his cheek? Surely, he must have heard them, as they whooshed through the air?  And yet he simply does not give a damn. On his face plays an fantastic ambiguousness, so perpetual, so eternal, so continuous. Neither red nor yellow nor green stays this man from frowning his queer little frown.

Many years have passed since I saw that painting, at a local high school art competition.

The painting didn't win, somehow. There are many enigmas in life; that was one of them. It also didn't place second, or third, or honorable mention, or even viewer's choice. A generic still life, full-color, took first, I think, and a photograph of a child, full black-and-white, took second, maybe. As a friend of mine once said, “what is this random crap!”  I don’t claim to remember much of any of it, and this is why: from one glance we know exactly what this (five apples, a kid in a swing) is.

But Continuous Ambiguous! I imagine it must be sitting in an attic somewhere, forgotten, the spirals of colors fading into a uniform grayscale. The owner must think it a failure, and chalked it up to a wild lapse in judgement. Perhaps one day, grown grey, he might climb the attic, offer the old man a cautious lol! what is this random crap! and retreat, biting his tongue in sympathy for a younger self.

Or perhaps not. Perhaps to this day, Continuous Ambiguous hangs proudly on the artist’s bedroom wall, as my own failed submission from that day does. Truthfully, it doesn’t matter. To quote Cookie Monster, that great dispensary of wisdom: “C is for Cookie, and that’s good enough for me.” I have seen it, and that’s good enough for me.

Art is in the eye of the audience, after all; whether the performer chooses to bow at the end is up to them. I, however, will clap regardless, politely, for the artist, for creating a work that brings together so neatly: continuity (the quelling of death); ambiguity (the quelling of staidness); hope.

Because that old man? I think he knows, about hope. Chalk it up to a wild guess. I think he knows, that those swirling colors do not come from nowhere. No, I think he understands they are the lost companions-- children, even-- of the monochrome world around him.

He stares out the window because he isn’t sure whether they are coming-- or going.