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Show Moon - 50 setting them off picturesque. On a side street roped off from traffic, a street fair done in bold dashes of light and color: a block-long row of craft booths-tables covered with tie-dyed cloths, spread out with jewelry, pottery, macrame, woodcrafts, paintings ranging from the terrible to the pretty good-food and drink concessions, fluttering banners, a lone violinist. The people milling about the booths are smiling at one another with that air of mutual congratulation New Yorkers conjure up for such events: We have not only survived, but we are having fun and liking one another, appreciating good and simple things like normal people. Here's my booth. I'm displaying some watercolors of trees that grow in Central Park. It's easy to overlook how wonderful those trees are, so I've painted them with all the love necessary to help people see. My paintings are always slightly out of control. Edges overlap, sag, and blur. Sometimes my trees seem to be sinking into the earth as if they're too heavy; other times they float above the ground as if they have no roots. I draw things the way I see them. And my vision is, well, sometimes a little strange. For a few people, this strangeness is wonderful. They say it makes my landscapes seem alive like human beings who feel too much. Not too many people want that sort of picture. It's an agony to sell my work, smiling at the people who cock their heads and cluck, or frown, or say politely, "Very nice." A few of them buy, most move on. I think the people who buy are mostly those who like the pretty colors. Now and then someone stops and sees what I'm trying to do. Mother, I was a few years out of art school at that fair. I knew my craft, but even now I feel apologetic for my art, which fails to be realistic in a factual way. |