The Marsh
It was a rainy afternoon. In a room at an art exhibition, I had discovered a small oil painting. That is a grandiose word—discover—but though it is grandiose the truth is that this painting was on its own in a poorly-lit corner, and entering the terribly meager area, it was hanging as though it had been left behind. This painting was most likely called something like The Marsh, so it was no work of some famous artist. And the painting itself was just brushstrokes of muddy water, damp earth, and thick vegetation in that earth, so from the perspective of a person attending the exhibition, I daresay it literally had not received a second glance.
There was something strange on top of that. The artist, while painting the overgrown plants, hadn’t used a single brush of green. The painting of the reeds, the poplars, the figs, it was all muddy yellow. It was a thick, leaden yellow, like wet plaster. Was this the color the painter had really seen? Or was there something he particularly liked, and he had willingly exaggerated? Standing before it, I could not help but mull over this doubt, along with the sensations I tasted from the painting.
And yet I came to understand, in line with what I was seeing, the terrifying power lurking within this painting. The soil in the foreground in particular was depicted with such precision that it was as if it made me feel clearly down to my legs a time I had stepped upon it. When I put my foot down it made a squelching noise, and I felt slippery mud covering my ankle. In this painting, I had perceived the figure of a tragic artist who had tried to capture nature so precisely. In doing so, even from this yellow plantlife there was a rapturous sensation of tragedy, the sort one received from all great works of art. Truth be told, of all the paintings, large and small, hanging in this exhibition, there was none so powerful as to hope to challenge this one.
“My, what a work!”
Along with these words I received a pat on the shoulder. Feeling as though something had been shaken from my soul, I whirled around.
“What do you think of it?” my partner asked nonchalantly, gesturing to the painting of the marsh with a freshly shaved chin. Fashionable brown suit, well-built, employed because of who he knew—he was a newspaper art critic. I recalled one or two unpleasant impressions from this reporter in the past, and so I gave a grudging reply.
“It’s a masterpiece.”
“A…masterpiece? That is rich!” He let out a belly laugh. This had apparently surprised him. Two or three patrons nearby looked over in agreement. I felt all the more uncomfortable.
“That is rich. Originally, you know, this painting was not a member’s painting. But, anyway, since he came around and kept asking us to display it, his widow petitioned a judge, and it finally ended up in this corner.
“Widow? So the person who painted this is dead?”
“He is dead. Though while he was alive, he certainly seemed like he was dead.”
At some point my curiosity overcame my distaste.
“In what way?”
“This painter had been quite mad for some time.”
“When he painted this?”
“Naturally. Who would have painted a painting of this color save for the mad? I have come to admire you for calling this a masterpiece. It is really quite rich!”
The reporter again triumphantly raised his voice in laughter. He must have assumed that I was ashamed by my lack of knowledge. Or to take it a step further, that he may even have thought to impress me with the supremacy of his aesthetics. However both of his expectations were futile. For while I had been listening to him, a feeling perilously close to solemnity had come over me in an indescribable motion. I stared again in terror at the painting of the marsh. And again within the small canvas, I perceived the figure of a tragic artist wracked by unease and anxiety.
“But they say you can’t paint as you think, so he certainly seems crazy. On that point alone, well, if you bought it you’d be doing him a favor.”
The reporter smiled cheerfully with a bright face. This was the tiny reward for the nameless artist—the one of us who could, through his sacrifice, make the world just a little better. I felt a strange shudder over my whole body, and for a third time I stared into this depressing oil painting. There, between the dim sky and the water, lived reeds the color of damp plaster, aspens, figs, wrought with a terrific force so that it was like looking at nature itself.
Staring down the reporter, I replied triumphantly, “It’s a masterpiece.”
(April 1919)