My mural taught me

Hey... I am again starting painting.......somehow it feels so much at home to be coloring and sketching as if this was my life. Though you all know I have very ordinary area of expertise which is IT domain and have been with it through the slows and bubbles for past 11 years.

First time I took to painting for no reason....did not know whether I had skill to do it or the patience or for that matter basic alignment/inclination towards playing with colors. Just took to it as was looking for alternatives to make life more meaningful. I have broken my life into weekly initiatives ....of course there are short term and long term goals but you know "term" and "short/long" are big variables which change because of everything possible in the world. So, wanted to have some initiatives which are less dependent on ever-changing world so chose weekly initiatives even if progress was slow as time allocated was less and that was painting.
Wanted to have better control on my life somehow.

But trust me derived benefits have been huge somehow I have left and right brain as people say and have different skill sets placed on both side so when one works overtime and is aligned towards short/long term goals other side requires more of weekly goals...................my brain thinking.

So this was trigger to start my painting .....and than the first hurdle to find a painting teacher who would be ready to teach an IT adult how to be with colors rather than strategies. My constraints - can attend classes only on weekends and teacher should be excelled in trying to make one pakka ghada somehow see colors. Miracle angel again appears found one though far off in Indiranagar and started classes every Saturday. As you would expect the IT mindset which has been only thing all around me for 11 years is over powering and somehow unconsciously I chose a huge board which I wanted to have murals and than acrylic colors. Board was huge like 3 feet by 4 feet. You can very well gauge that this was definitely again translating into short/long term initiative defeating the purpose of weekly objective. But than it is again me basically always trying to set high goals somehow......................

First few hurdles teacher told the huge board has to be prepared for murals which requires me coating it with lime paste 5 times and waiting it to dry and than rubbing it with sand paper to smoothen it. First accident, rubbed my fingers along with the lime paste while scrubbing with sand paper - realized focus and attention towards a different area is required. Lesson learnt seemingly easy and low grade tasks also have to be learnt with finesse to achieve bigger objectives.

Now board is ready than I was pretty gud drawing the pictures outline which I was suppose to mural. .............................was impressed with myself. After that mural project started and I learnt very hard way that I lack very basic skill of being patient. So, told the Angel this is why you got me here so, that I recognize and learn patience.

Trust me agonising 20 weeks just to finish the mural part.........which is yet not touched the brush. And infront of huge class of other art students had n corrections to be done on my mural. But Angel was watching and neither the painting teacher lost patience nor I found my ego which is really magical............especially in current day environment where these are emotions which are always on forefront( born to practice every time).

Than great day arrived teacher said OK go ahead these are brushes and colors. Start and now you can see there was huge amount of green to be painted and I don't like green at all other than in the plants - no green clothes, no green cars, no green walls. And here is where my pakka ghada brain came to the front informed my teacher I don't like green at all. She smiled and said start with other colors. So, I started though grumbling that why did teacher not tell me alternative of green. Again my skill of finding instant decisions - complete solutions rather than working on problem and resolving step by step. I don't know whether teacher was knowingly working on me to mellow down my sharp edges or was it Angel teaching me skills which are otherwise very difficult to practice in real life if you don't possess them or even difficult to acknowledge that we don't possess them. She would not have known me so well. Have been with her only for 20 weeks.

Painting started some colors were nice to me gelled blended nicely. but the colors red/ black just refuse to blend with each other to my teacher satisfaction. Had to do redo it atleast 5-6 time. Patience was being tested somehow ego did not surface no giving up. Also, somehow was learning to be student who would be graded and evaluated by art teacher another human being. One more after thought some things merge easily into each other without us noticing others just stare at us until we bend infornt of them and work with them rather than work on them.

And than teacher said I think it looks great and I could not belive that it really looked gud but I trusted her judgement.

Now, the big problem of working with green she said ok if you don't like green find shades of green and now I had daunting task of finding shade of green which I would like. It is easier said than done as it is not mixing just colors but also to see how the colors look on board and must not forget this is my first board in my whole life.

Slowly really slowly spent one whole class of 3 hours to figure out shade of green which I thought I can tolerate and teacher said ok go ahead and paint. I painted it was not so annoying as I thought it would be to paint green and the board was nearing completing. Everything ready just the background was left. She had taught me if I don't like something I was responsible for finding alternative no running away at all or delegating the task to someone else.

I thought that should be easy just use the brush and manage 2 colors shading after all I have played with so many colors and painted and shaded so many things by now. But trust me whether it was the last part of jouney or whether it was the pre conceived notion that it is going to be easy by me as it was repetitive by nature was the final hurdle. Board was 3 feet by 4 feet and only half of it was painted with images in different colors and rest half was to be shaded in 2 colors. Literally had to grind my teeth and do it as brush square feet area is like 1 inch by 1 inch cannot take bottle of color and just spread had to go stroke by stroke. And of course corrections of strokes in monotonous back ground area where I have tried to be faster than my skill. And I thought I was extremely skilled.........phew.
Took almost 2 days which is like 6 hours to finish the background but it was done. Again I learnt life is full of challenges only for half; rest half is monotonous still have to walk through it in the perfect manner to complete the whole landscape and trust me this boring part requires the most corrections - so humilating.

And than the whole class stood around it and said I think this is the best painting that we have seen in long long time and coming from me who has never touched a board has been technically strong and creatively weak definitely calls for Pakoda party. And teacher's mom got all of us pakodas. I have never seen appreciation come in 6 months and yes it had taken me 6 months to finish my first board which right now holds center of attraction in my living area and won pakoda party.
The thing that go unnoticed with the boards are lessons of life which I practised and realized unconciously just doing a board.