STREAKS, STROKES and SHADES: Life is Art

By Chris TILEWA

We go great lengths for satisfaction and realisation, and after the basic needs of food, emotion and, perhaps, sex is met we seek luxury, beauty. But when real life is not making this happen, it becomes our aspiration and life goal. We create new realities, in our hearts, in our arts. Between our reality and our dreams are a yawning space and a great, optimistic ocular faculty that curiously observes the reconciliation of our artful dreams and our exacting realities. In spite of our outrageous realities we are all patrons of beauty.

Aesthetics is a universal objective; though what we see as beautiful and artistic is determined by culture and perception, and hence we say beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, still, art cuts through the barriers of culture and times. Whatever our culture and civilisation we want to hear a song; write, listen or read a piece of poetry out loud to a friend; see beautiful paintings; watch breathtaking movies and take photographs of happy little moments. We are at awe of nature’s order and the things around us- the hills, valleys, plantations and space, – that may seem chaotic still have about them the awesomeness of impressive creation.

There is a piece of art in everything, in everyone. And the ultimate end of art is not merely in the beauty it expresses; the scenic portrayal of striking reality and phenomenal concepts, but also in the feelings it arouses. For that is what we remember of it all, of people in our lives, of moments, of memories that shape our lives: did they make us weep, frightened, irritated, angry, and secured, or did they enchant us. Every experience, like the ornate and subtle features and element of art, does their part in us to ensure those enduring gestures.

And that is how we approach everything else in life. We naturally give the first hearing to our feelings. It is most real to us. What we feel, we feel and there is no talking us out of it. Except of, course, if there is an alternate feeling purveyed. We seek things that make us comfortable, happy and loved. Our desires and dreams are made real to us by the prospect of what they make us feel about the world and ourselves, and in the pursuit of these things we are advised to ‘follow our heart’. Because no matter how we try to evaluate things by reasoning, by data and facts, (which nevertheless are of immense importance in maintaining a balance perspective) our sincerest judgements lie in the ultimate question of art; what we felt about it rather than how nice it appeared.

We are all in a way artists; always in the business of making ourselves look good and come out better, there is a picture of our perfect self upheld in our hearts- we are our own most venerated masterpiece imaginable. Like in clean canvass we wish we can make ourselves whatever we desire, make amends for our imperfections by the flick of a brush, erasing and dabbing again till we reach what exactly pleases us. We have the idea how we want our stories told; whether for the record, expressive, didactic or aesthetic end. But our canvasses are not so clean after all, and things, some things, had gone out of our control. The world had messed with it for quite a while before we took charge- this canvass, our minds- and had set the backgrounds it will advance in. And when we should take charge of it, we have in our hands tasks, either to correct and re-pattern, or make final touches and finishing strokes. But every inclination towards change in our lives, towards creation, begins with a ‘wash of black’, an inertia void, because all things in nature, according to Leonardo da Vinci, are dark except where they are revealed by light.

Chris Tilewa

Chris TILEWA is a young Nigerian who writes. He has written a number of short stories, essays and poems. While he writes prose; fictions and non fictions, he also nurses a mild love for poetry. He holds an anaemic faith that he will soon contract the demon required to write a book.

Lyriversity — Liberty of Creativity