How did you get to live in paintings for free?
By practicing my daily admiration towards them up to the point in which, if I accidentally cut my fingers, no blood would flow, but drips of paint. In addition to this, I practiced the gift of invisibility. It is crucial because, if you were visible, you would change the look of the painting in a way the artist wouldn’t want.
In which paintings did you feel the best?
Monet’s Water Lilies are good hosts, in Sense of Sight, by Annie Louisa Swynnerton, I glanced at the sky so much that I felt my wings grow.
Does living in paintings have its disadvantages?
The paintings are wonderful places where you can spend your time, but it is a different story if you want to eat something, because it is compulsory that you enter a painting with nothing else but your own person. Food is forbidden, as well as a mere blanket that could make you feel warm. I had a rough time with Arcimboldo’s Summer and Autumn. There were so many juicy fruits and vegetables, but they all had the same taste: of very old paint. This doesn’t mean that it would be a better experience if the paint is brand new…Anyway…Another painting that kept me off guard was Monet’ Magpie. It was very, very cold in it and I was only dressed in a Romanian blouse and denim skirt!
Is there a way you can detect between a genuine painting and a forged one?
I have beautiful dreams when I sleep in an authentic painting. If I fall asleep in Leonardo’s paintings, the night lasts as long as The Renaissance. Other times, I take a short nap on one of Monet’s haystacks. As for a fake painting, it gives me nightmares.
How do you spot the next tenants of the masterpieces?
They have a special way of glancing at the exhibits. They use their rollers skates in order to see as many painting as possible in a short period of time. It may look like a shallow approach, but it is not because these tourists almost always have an art book on their nightstand.
How are your rectangular shaped hosts?
They are pretty much like people: sometimes they are glad, other times are sad and other times are scared… One day, in May, the light was entering the gallery and it enlivened all paintings, even those which had dark themes felt spring in their souls.
What are the paintings’ greatest fears?
They are sometimes afraid that an art thief might send them away from the eyes of the tourists. They feed on our admiration, the more admirers they have the happier they get. However, when this danger occurs, tenants of the paintings from all over the world come and all live in the same work of art. The painting becomes so heavy, that not even a crane can lift it. And the danger disappears. Yet, the paintings have this fear ever since the tenants were not so well organized as now and didn’t have a NGO to defend art.
Does living in paintings help you have access to the minds of the great artists?
For the tenants of the paintings art is a visceral, emotional experience rather than a cerebral one. We are BA in the paintings’ feelings, not in their thoughts.
So, their inspiration cannot become yours.
I cannot create paintings, it is true, but inspiration can manifest itself in other ways, for instance, I can write a poem about a certain painting. An art form can be the starting point for another one. In my case, for instance, Sergiu Grapă’s work called Poems’ Hunting inspired me to write a poem.
Can you tell us a funny story about your experience as a tenant of paintings?
There are several funny stories, but there’s one that crosses my mind now. I wanted to live in a storm painted by Turner, of whom I knew he tied himself to the ship’s topmast so that he could better capture the nature’s burst. And I caught a severe cold.
Thank you!
Thank you too!
The image: Sense of Sight by Annie-Swynnerton
Source: youtube
clipe de reverie 