More Something from Nothing

     As I've said, I've always been inspired by the idea of making something from nothing.
     It started with Moby Dick. Early in the book, the protagonist enters an inn and encounters a painting on the wall. At first the painting seems to be a washed out gray emptiness. But when the man looks closer and allows his eyes to adjust to the dim light of the pub, details come into view. What first appear to be three dark parallel lines become the masts of a foundering ship, and a cloudy form hovering over the ship becomes a massive whale churning the deeps into a pasty froth. I loved the image and immediately wanted to see the painting for myself. I knew the work was complete fiction and the described painting didn't exist. So the next thought that occured to me was to create this painting myself. How hard could it be?
     What really appealed to me was the idea of taking something that doesn't exist, and taking a part of it out, essentially recreating it into the real world. Why I like this I can't say. But in a way it provides a bridge into something invisible. Aside from music, there is nothing more invisible and unsubstantive than a story. A story doesn't exist. It's merely words on a page describing something that doesn't exist. Thin stuff.
     But if you come face to face with a piece of that world. Something you can hold in your hands and touch, it links you to the story and makes it more real and powerful.
     As a quick aside, you can see the same idea play out at any Trek convention. People avidly collect props and replicas of Star Trek, even though the world they inhabit doesn't exist. But when you hold a phaser or communicator, or talk to a Ferengi face to face, than your perception of the show changes. Suddenly the world of Star Trek exists. It may not be close in space or time, but it exists out there more fully in some form.
     So I set out to paint this picture that was described in Melville's work. And I did it all wrong.
     First off, I'd never painted anything before. So I went to the local craft store for supplies. Since I was living in an apartment at the time I knew that I wanted to start out small and with paints that could be cleaned up with water. A bit of research indicated that acrylics would be the best bet for my project. So I grabbed some colors, brushes and some small canvas squares and set to work.
     The problems I encountered were self inflicted, but not unreasonable. I wanted to make this painting on the cheap, so I grabbed cheap paint. Instead of painters acrylics, I'd grabbed the equivalent of poster paint. Now there are many corners you can cut in art and painting is no exception. But the one thing you don't want to skimp on is quality paints. I say this because good paints can cover a lack of skill easily, but only focused talent can make poster paints look good on anything other than posters. The painting became a muddy mess, composed of swirls of muddy colors and accents of humility. I set it aside and vowed never to touch it again.
     But I have the wonderful character trait of being a skinflint.
     What was I to do with the supplies I'd already purchased? I decided to work on another project.
     At the time I was playing Relentless: Twinsen's Odyssey. Incredible computer game. After a little thought, I decided I'd like a painting based on one of the scenes. This fit nicely with my idea of making something tangible from something invisible. I did a screen capture on a likely setting and then sketched out the picture on canvas. But again, I was using poster paints and my lack of experience was disheartening. Simple lines became blobby scrawls, and bright colors mutated into ugly browns. It was a mess.
     So like all good efforts that fail, I put the paints aside and vowed never to take them up again.
     And like all worthy things, I took them up later.