Van Gogh Reborn!

265

Art Class (3)

“Yes, that’s what art is.”

Principal Pusang smiled brightly.

“Art is not just something beautiful and amazing. Nor is it something that has a profound philosophy or meaning.”

Some of the children tilted their heads in confusion.

The children who grew up in Paris, the city of art, must have seen a lot of artworks since they were young.

There were many artists who worked in France, as well as things that were plundered from other countries.

And there was also street art that could be found everywhere in the city. The children of Paris grew up in art.

That’s why they might not understand Nana and Pusang, who called their own drawings art.

“Teacher!”

“Tell me, Pantin.”

“Then what is art?”

“That’s a very difficult question. Actually, I don’t know what art is either.”

The children were puzzled.

“Haha. Don’t worry. There won’t be a test question asking what art is.”

At least not in the first grade.

“How do we learn if we don’t know?”

“We won’t learn. We won’t teach. We’ll just do it.”

Pusang took out an oil pastel from his desk.

“Let’s play with oil pastels today.” 𝐟r𝗲𝚎𝚠e𝐛no𝘃𝗲𝐥.c𝗼m

Pusang and the assistant teacher gave each student an oil pastel set and a sheet of paper.

There were 20 colors.

“Pick your three favorite colors.”

The children picked their favorite colors without much hesitation.

‘Where.’

I first picked yellow and blue, and then fell into a brief dilemma.

I also liked green, but I could mix yellow and blue if I needed it.

If I had to add something, I needed a red color, and there was a very vivid red oil pastel.

It was similar to Schmincke’s cadmium red tone.

“It looks like everyone has chosen. Mia, what colors did you choose?”

“Orange, chick, and sky blue.”

“They’re all nice colors. Why do you like orange?”

Mia blinked her eyes and opened her mouth shyly, as if she couldn’t think of a special reason.

“Because it’s pretty.”

“Haha. Yes. It’s very pretty. Then what are some things that are orange?”

“A basketball.”

“A basketball! I didn’t think of that. Yes. There are orange basketballs. What else?”

“Uh. Slippers and carrots and pumpkins.”

“Good. You did very well.”

Pusang looked around the students and asked.

“Is there anyone else who chose orange?”

“Me!”

“Oh, yes. Pantin. What do you think of when you think of orange?”

“Sunset.”

“Yes. Sunset is also a very beautiful orange.”

“Me!”

“Jerome also liked orange. Yes. Jerome, what do you think of when you think of orange?”

“Roof!”

“That’s right.”

Pusang, I, and the other children all exclaimed softly.

Come to think of it, there were many buildings with orange roofs.1)

I wondered what he meant by asking us to choose our favorite colors, but it seemed like a time to explore the meaning and emotion of colors.

Mia thought of a basketball and slippers first when she thought of orange.

She probably liked basketball and had orange slippers at home.

Pantin, who thought of sunset, must have had a very good experience.

“Why are the slippers orange?”

“I thought of tangerines when I thought of orange.”

“Sunset is really beautiful.”

The children who chose orange, and those who didn’t, were amazed by the presentations of their classmates.

Their thoughts expanded by sharing different images.

Pusang also asked questions to some of the children who chose other colors, and the children raised their hands eagerly.

“Well, then we have about 30 minutes left for class. Let’s draw a picture with only the colors we chose for 30 minutes.”

It felt good.

When the art class was over and it was time to go home, Jacques came back to the classroom.

It looked like he had a slight bruise around his eye.

He looked at me, then turned his head and packed his stuff and left.

“Don’t mind him.”

Jerome came over.

“I went to the same school as him, and he’s just like that. He can’t do anything by himself.”

“Yeah.”

He seemed worried as he looked at him.

I wasn’t worried about anything else, but I was worried that he would live his short life in such a twisted way.

“But.”

“But?”

“Are you friends with Henri Marso?”

“Yeah.”

Jerome’s eyes widened and he grinned.

“Then do you really work with him?”

“Well, yeah.”

I wondered if he was a fan of Marso and wanted to ask for an autograph, and I smiled awkwardly.

“I love Henri Marso’s paintings. I’m jealous.”

“I like them too.”

“Really? Which ones do you like? I like the ones between 100 and 200.”

He had painted over 800 self-portraits, and the fans seemed to call them by numbers.

Between 100 and 200.

I had no idea.

“I liked the Shadow.”

“Oh! The one he submitted to the Whitney Biennale? I didn’t see that one.”

“He’s moving it to the Marso Gallery next month.”

“Really?”

“What are you talking about?”

I thought today would be quiet, but the kids flocked to the Henri Marso story.

“It’s not easy.”

I had been looking for a gallery site for four days, but I couldn’t find a place that I liked.

Grandpa, Bang Tae-ho, and I were tired and resting at a cafe near the Dallyda Plaza.

“Are there any other places?”

“There are, but the good ones are restricted.”

It wasn’t just a problem of Montmartre.

Paris was protecting old buildings for urban landscape and cultural preservation, so it was hard to find a large site in a good location.

At least residential buildings were allowed to be redeveloped and rebuilt for safety reasons, but the places where apartments were built were not very good.

Most of them were on hills or on slopes because they had settled on cheap land a long time ago.

“How about up there?”

Arabi, the cafe owner who helped me plant sunflowers at the Dallyda Plaza, asked as he put down a chocolate muffin.

“Up there?”

“You know Pizza Hut, right? Next to it used to be a car dealership, but it went bankrupt after electric cars came out. The land is flat and it hasn’t been sold for a long time, so the price might be cheap.”

It sounded plausible, so I looked at Grandpa and Bang Tae-ho.

They both seemed to have the same idea.

“What’s the address?”

“It should be Lamarche Street.”

“Oh, I found it.”

Bang Tae-ho brought up a satellite photo on his tablet. It was 162 Lamarche Street, and as Arabi said, the site was quite large.

It had a parking lot that could fit a lot of cars, so it wasn’t unreasonable.

“I wish it was a little bigger.”

“Let’s check it out. The phone number is.”

Bang Tae-ho searched the internet for this and that and called the real estate agent.

“There’s an apartment behind it. I heard they were going to demolish it because it’s so old.”

Arabi settled in and continued the story.

“Demolish? You mean another building is coming in?”

Grandpa asked.

“Well. That’s how it should be, but the construction company went bankrupt a long time ago, so it’s complicated.”

“Hmm.”

“If redevelopment comes in, the people who live there will have to go somewhere. But it’s not even that.”

“So you mean they’re demolishing it for safety reasons?”

“Yes. It’s dangerous to live there as it is. And it’s burdensome to move. The people who live there are in a dire situation.”

“If it’s like that, another company should jump in.”

“I don’t know. There are plenty of other places, but why would they bother with this one? There are empty houses everywhere.”

I don’t know for sure, but the building looks old and neglected. There’s no management company, and no new businesses are interested in moving in. Maybe it could be used as a gallery site, along with the former car dealership.

“Yes, yes. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Bang Tae-ho ended the call.

“We’re meeting tomorrow.”

Grandpa nodded.

“Stop by on your way home and take a look. You have to see it with your own eyes.”

“Of course.”

Grandpa and Bang Tae-ho looked at me.

I had a mouthful of chocolate muffin, so I just nodded.

“Then, take care.”

“Thank you.”

I said goodbye to Mr. Arabi and got in the car.

Lamahuk entered 162nd Street on the navigation, and it didn’t take long to get there.

“It’s close.”

“Yeah.”

“It’ll be easy to meet up with the kids.”

“Hmm. That would be nice.”

Most of the kids I hung out with at Dallida Square and Bugrenelli Mall lived in this Montmartre district.

If I built a gallery near Dallida Square, the playground kids would feel like they were going to the playground in front of their house.

“Here it is.”

As we got out of the car, we saw an empty building and a large parking lot.

It looked like it hadn’t been maintained for a long time, with broken glass and piles of trash. But it seemed okay to build a gallery.

“It’s turned into a dump.”

Grandpa looked around and clicked his tongue.

It seemed like the people living nearby were secretly dumping their trash here.

“How much is this place?”

“I’ll have to ask, but the price on the internet is cheaper than anywhere else.”

“There must be a reason why it’s not selling.”

Grandpa inspected the surroundings carefully.

It was a lot of money, and it was for my gallery, so he approached it more cautiously than usual.

I felt relieved, since I had no knowledge of land or buildings.

“As long as I don’t plan to resell it, isn’t it better if it’s cheap?”

“You never know what will happen. What if you have to sell it later?”

“That’s true. I could go bankrupt.”

“Kid. You should think about doing better and moving to another place.”

Grandpa always thought positively about anything related to me.

Moving to a better place.

That sounded like a dream that was too big.

As we were looking around.

“No way! Why do I have to do that!”

I heard a child’s angry voice and turned my head. Jacques was being held by someone.

1)There are two theories as to why the roofs of European houses are orange.

One is a hypothesis related to the material, which is that Europeans mainly used red clay with a high iron content to build their houses.

The speculation is that the iron in the clay oxidized and turned red when it was baked.

The fact that Eastern European countries with a lot of iron in their clay have red and orange roofs supports this.

Another hypothesis is that during World War II, they painted their roofs in red hues to indicate that they were civilian residential areas to the bombers.

But considering that the roofs were already red before the war, this might not have much significance.