Compliments

September 19, 2016. Oil on canvas. 15 x 20cm

Russia. Moscow. 蘇茲達爾農舎博物館

That was a cold rainy morning in a small town called 蘇茲達爾 near Moscow. Our group went on to sight seeing at a farm huts museum which I did not feel very attractive to me. Therefore I went out to the cool lake side to do my plein air painting.

As a result of 1 hour painting in the cold air, I was freezing. I quickly packed my stuff and run into the entrance of the museum. It had no air conditioning there. Still cool. But at least the shelter hut was much better than the outdoor with wind and rain hitting me fiercely.

After I warmed my body I wanted to paint again. But my body told me that I could not run out to the outside any more.

Therefore I decided to see if I could paint at that entrance. But the entrance was a busy passage and a rather small area. I could not communicate with the Russian speaking managers there and tried to use all my body language to ask them nicely.

At last, I started to paint with only one pen to ease the awkwardness without knowing whether I was permitted or not.

The staff, which were all old ladies kept looking at me with great curiosity and little confidence throughout the 20 mins I worked in this little painting. I could tell they were quite disappointed during the first half.

But when I was 70% finished they started to visualize the whole picture and they started to act very happy about it. I didn’t know what exactly they said but I could tell it was a great deal of compliments.

The busy passage allowed over 100 visitors to review my painting during that 20 mins. I was happy because I could see many of us liked what they saw! And standing up, holding the painting board, painted with 1 pen was an unforgetable experience for me, not to mention I always welcomed compliments, especially from a foreign nationality which was best known for their art and culture accomplishment.