Removing the Mask

Our inheritance:

a cerebral closet full

of ill-fitting masks.

                                    ~ Lori Allen

I recently painted the Buddhist bodhisattva Avalokitesvara.  (See her photo in my prior blog post, "Bodhisattva Antidepressant")  I have learned to expect that my paintings will never be copies of photos or the actual subjects, but rather my interpretation of the same.  Reminding myself of that expectation, I can relax and not get every single detail right as I paint.  I re-interpret what a photographer, nature, or some other entity has created, what I am inspired by.  It is a lovely way to create.

While I am not expecting my work to be a carbon copy of what I am painting, I have finally identified the one thing that almost always disappoints me as I finish a painting.  That is - taking off the mask.  Or masque.  Or frisket.  These are mediums painted on paper, usually before color is applied, that will dry to resist water and color.  When the painting is finished, the mask is rolled or rubbed off to reveal an unpainted area.  In watercolor, I was taught, they add interest to the painting.

Or not.  Sometimes they add big dead spots that the painter then tries to blend in with the rest of the finished picture, or that she applies another medium to (gallons of gold paint) to try to make it look like an integrated and pre-planned part of the painting.  I have achieved satisfaction in about 10 percent of the painting I apply mask to, but mostly I don't like it.

I don't like if for all the reasons I don't like masks worn by me or other beings.  Well, again, I do like masks in about 10 percent or less of my life situations - Halloween, parties, pretend play - but I am talking about the masks that are worn everyday by all of us.  Our happy masks, or false interest masks, or being who you want me to be masks; our being strong or caring or unhurt masks; our I can't see that, can't hear that mask - all these and any worn to mislead others, inevitably disappoint when taken off.

I have spent much of my adult life trying to walk the streets of life mask-free, defending my natural features as acceptable ways of being in the world.  Recently, I had some minor surgery on my eye.  A good friend took me to the clinic and stayed with me during the procedure.  As the nurse prepped the eye area with a multitude of antiseptic squares, she said, "thank you so much for not wearing your eye make-up today."  My non-swabbed eye met the gaze of my friend.  We both burst out laughing. "What's so funny?" asked the nurse.

"Do you even own  eye make-up?" my friend asked through her laughter?

"Not since the 80s," I crowed.  I felt like an addict announcing thirty years of sobriety.  "Not anymore." I don't begrudge anyone a bit of eye or any other make-up, I do wear colored lip gloss from time to time.  What giving up make-up, my mask, did for me was remind me that not only are my natural physical features okay unaltered, but also are my natural emotional, feeling, knowing, and being-in-the-world features.

My art, like my life, from this time forward, will use masks only for special effects, fancy parties, and intentional distortions.  For all other times, people will be able to see my paintings with all the colors, swirls, unintended splatters, and blemishes combined to make something that they may recognize as my honest interpretation of the subject, as my authentic statement on that moment.  Now . .  where did I put that gold paint?