Mrs. Chatterbox and I saw signs like this often while traveling in Turkey. Sorry about the blurry quality of this photograph, but the bus wouldn’t slow down and I didn’t want to miss the shot.
I’ve been wanting to share this image because it makes me chuckle, and I think everyone can use a good laugh. But more important, signs like these prompt an interesting ethical question: the watches are undoubtedly fake—yet genuinely so—but is this false advertising? What do you think?
The two pictures above show facility with a paintbrush as well as a firm understanding of color and composition, but they are not great paintings. What makes them remarkable is that they were painted by a fifteen year old boy by the name of Ruiz. Ruiz would later quarrel with his father, whose surname was common, the Spanish equivalent of “Smith.” The boy would eventually sign his paintings with his mother’s maiden name—Picasso.
Over the years many people have told me they hate Picasso’s work. I’ve said to them, “Look a bit harder; Picasso created more paintings than any other artist in history and I’m certain he painted something you can enjoy.” I doubt I have changed many minds.
In 1940 Picasso was the most famous artist alive. By 1950 he was the most famous artist to have ever lived. It’s understandable that legends would swirl around someone to have achieved this level of success. The following is one of my favorites:
Pablo’s father was himself a painter as well as an instructor at the Barcelona Art Academy. It’s said that one day Pablo entered his father’s studio and studied the work in progress on his father’s easel, a scene crowded with the pigeons that flocked in the plaza outside the family home. As the story goes, Pablo gazed at the body of a dead pigeon his father was using as a model. He picked up his father’s brushes and added his own pigeon to the canvas. His father entered the studio, saw what Pablo had done and vowed to never paint again. According to legend, he was horrified that after years of painting and teaching he couldn’t handle a brush nearly as well as a ten year old.
This account might be an exaggeration, but there’s no doubt that Pablo was a precocious boy and by the time he was thirteen his budding talent already overshadowed his father's.
But Picasso lived and painted for nearly eight more decades. Having mastered all there was to learn about traditional technique, what was left for him to do? Repeat his accomplishments ad nauseum? He chose not to pursue academia, deciding instead to forge a new path, one never before traveled. He shattered reality and reassembled it into what would later be called Cubism. He embraced the ideas of primitive cultures in an effort to probe beneath the surface of things to explore transcendent truths. Museums across the planet were filled with paintings replicating the natural world, but for him this was quite literally child’s play.
I hear people say of Picasso, “My kid can paint better than that!” As if there was no difference between the work of Picasso and a child. I’ve studied Picasso’s later works and they do look childlike. I remember driving past a billboard advertising a restaurant chain. The billboard showed a burger and fries drawn in crayon, designed to look like a child’s drawing. But you could tell a Madison Avenue adman had hired a professional illustrator to mimic the manner in which children draw. This happens all the time; yesterday I saw a TV commercial for an airline with kids drawing the Statue of Liberty, Mt. Rushmore and the Golden Gate Bridge—destinations serviced by the airline. But it was appallingly apparent that a deception was taking place—kids don’t draw that way, but adult artists pretending to be children do.
So when someone says they can’t tell the difference between Picasso’s work and a child they’re unwittingly offering up an extremely high compliment. Picasso could paint like a virtuoso when he was ten, yet in his nineties he became a child and painted like one. Amazing! He’d come full circle, harnessing and reversing the monster plaguing humanity from the start—time. Never before has this been accomplished through the power of art.
Today is the one year anniversary of Chubby Chatterbox. Our son CJ came up with the idea of starting a blog because I was depressed over numerous rejections from literary agents, one of whom told me I didn’t have a flair for writing and should try something else. CJ, who at the time had more confidence in my writing ability than I did, suggested I circumvent the publishing world by creating an audience of my own.
As children often do, he threw my own words back at me: sometimes it’s necessary to think outside the box. I patiently listened as he convinced me that traditional publishing was, for me, a dead end. But something was holding me back—fear. What if people didn’t like my stories? What if I ran out of ideas? What if a blog was too complicated for a computer-illiterate like me to manage? I dragged my heels and delayed posting because I knew that once I started I’d feel committed to doing whatever it took to make my blog successful.
CJ and I had been playing with a free template and I’d been running him ragged with difficult requests over what my site should look like. I think I was trying to wear him out, convince him to give up because I was too unreasonable to work with, but he hung in there and accommodated my excessive requests.
On August 1st of last year I finally took a deep breath, and with my heart pounding in my chest I entered my first post. I started with a childhood incident involving my eighty-six year old mother: Terms and Limits. I received no comments, and only one visit that first day—from Romania. It took weeks before anyone pressed the button to follow my blog, but with CJ and Mrs. Chatterbox’s encouragement I stuck with it.
Chubby Chatterbox has come a long way since then. I’ve written two hundred posts and I’m closing in on two hundred and fifty members, and I haven’t come close to running out of stories. I wish I could express how deeply I appreciate the e-mails and comments I receive—Manna from heaven for a writer. I love meeting my fellow bloggers, even if it’s only online, and learning how you think. I sincerely believe I’m becoming a better writer by reading so many fine posts; the talent on the blogosphere is astonishing.
I’m asked often if my stories are true, and I guess that depends on your definition of the word “true.” They’re certainly my truth, although some claim I’ve always had an overactive imagination. Occasionally I post pure fiction, but when I do I identify it as such. Otherwise, I relate events as I remember them, although I do change names and add a bit of spice to the stew. Otherwise, these stories are an accurate portrait of my life up until now.
From time to time I mention that Mrs. Chatterbox and our son CJ both work for the local police department. I understand that more of our City’s finest are enjoying Chubby Chatterbox. In an effort to avoid what could be an unpleasant situation for me, I’m now addressing only those with the power to arrest me: before slapping me in handcuffs, please note that any stories with references to my drug experimentation, lack of respect for current laws, erratic driving habits or wild nights drinking on the town are pure fiction. I repeat: total fabrications. No need to throw me in a cell with Chester the Molester.
