21th of November, 2021

Dear friend,

These past two days studying at an atelier were, as you said they would be, incredible.

It's really impressive how much you can learn only by observing a real master working in their art. The hand movements, the rush, or even the strength they touch the canvas with their brush. All these details there are so hard to get when you are just watching an online class or even from instructional art books.

Said that I must say as well that I'm really happy that writing, and not painting, is my art.

And there is nothing to do with the painting itself. For times I wished to be a master of painting, I really did, but I lack the technique and talent for that, and if Flaubert was right when he said that talent is a long patience, so it is even worse, I would lack three things instead of two.

I learned a lot in the past two days, and for my relief, I found at the atelier, the solution for the problems and mistakes that I was making at home when trying to paint.

Who would have thought that the slight change in the brush's bent could have such extraordinary effects of transforming densely mixed cores into feathers that not only modify the drawing but give it a kind of essence of its own, as if for a second, by a stroke placed in the right place, life stopped for a few moments in the image and recognized itself in it.

And that's here, dear friend, we artists get lost. All of us, of all types, painters, writers, sculptors, poets, everyone from the lowest to the highest grade, from apprentice to master, are equally seduced by the opportunity to capture that moment where art holds life.

We feel it, don't we? We feel that it is within our reach. We just need to change one or two things.

We foolishly believe that the desired perfection is found in the next word we try instead of the one already chosen. We believe that beauty is right there, after one more retouch, one more brushstroke on that face that until moments ago seemed so beautiful. And then suddenly we also feel that something profoundly essential has shifted. That feeling of closeness to life became a little more opaque. And what do we do? Shall we stop there? Never! Never!

We are even more sure that the third word chosen will synthesize everything we wanted to say before! That a darker color this time will highlight the shadows that will give the feeling to that portrait's empty eyes! And from then on, we sink deeper and deeper when we don't realize that the beauty and life resided in our work before precisely because of the simplicity they had.

They say that the devil dwells in the details, and the details, being most often ornaments, are not essential to good work, whatever it may be.