Van Gogh Reborn!

269

Meeting in a Strange Place (2)

“Before that.”

Marso looked at me and said something out of the blue.

“You’re going to draw me from now on.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Just do as I say.”

He had cancelled the appointment without a word, and he had broken his promise not to lecture me. And now he wanted me to draw him during class time.

“I’m going to attend the class.”

“That doesn’t make any sense. Why do I have to listen to what Marso says?”

“You’re a student.”

Marso said with his usual confidence and no doubt.

"And I’m a teacher."1)

“Hurry up and draw.”

Henri Marso urged Ko Hun, who was speechless with disbelief, and continued the class.

“This is an ancient Egyptian painting.”

Henri Marso displayed on the touch screen board.2)

“It’s a part of a mural found in the tomb of a man named Nebamun. It depicts a garden with a pond.”

“A pond?”

The students who saw tilted their heads. They felt that something was wrong with the painting, even though they didn’t know why.

The pond was seen from above, but the fish and ducks were lying sideways on the surface of the water.

“You’re right to see it as strange.”

Henri Marso took the students’ questions for granted and began to explain.

“The person who drew this picture did not draw what he saw. It’s more like a map than a picture.”

The students nodded.

“He wanted to show exactly where the pond was, what was in which position, and what it looked like.”

Henri Marso pointed to a fish.

“If he had drawn the top view of a fish swimming in the pond, would he be able to tell what it looked like, or what kind of fish it was?”

“No!”

“Right. The same goes for the ducks and the trees lying sideways. The ancient Egyptian painters drew things in the shape that they could recognize best.”

The students finally understood why the Egyptian paintings looked so unfamiliar.

“Next.”

Henri Marso showed the next picture.

"This is a painting of bird hunting in the marshes. What’s strange here?"3)

Ko Hun raised his hand, but Marso ignored him and continued the explanation.

“How is the man in the middle who is holding a bird standing?”

“Sideways!”

“Look again.”

The children who said he was standing sideways looked at the pharaoh again.

At first glance, he seemed to be standing sideways, but when they looked closely, he was unnatural.

His lower body was facing sideways, but his upper body was facing forward.

Marso pointed to his feet.

“His feet are facing sideways, but his upper body is facing forward. The reason why he made him take such an uncomfortable posture is.”

“Because it’s easier to recognize!”

“Right.”

Marso was satisfied with the students’ answer and pointed to the man’s eyes.

“For the same reason, his eyes are also facing forward. If he was looking sideways, he would have to draw them like this.”

Marso drew a simple eye from the side to make it easier for the students to understand.

“Find more.”

The students looked for what was strange and found that the person under the pharaoh in the middle was small.

“Right. The painters of this period enlarged and reduced the size according to the importance. The man in the middle is the pharaoh and the one below him is his servant.”

Marso looked around the students and said.

“The pharaoh is great. A great being is big. This is an abstract concept. It’s not drawing things as they appear, but saying that trees look like this and fish look like this, and drawing them in their complete form is also an abstract domain.”

Marso wrote abstract next to the word Egypt on the board.

“Next is Greece.”

He showed the statues of Greece and told the story.

“The ancient Greeks’ faith was closely related to sports. They regarded winning in competitions as the grace of God. Therefore, the winners left their bodies as statues to prove that they had received the baptism of God. Of course, they wanted to look proud.”

As Marso showed them , the students nodded.4)

“The human body is not perfectly proportioned, but compared to ancient Egypt, you can see that it is quite realistically depicted. The painters and sculptors of ancient Greece studied how people looked and moved, and tried to express them more beautifully. In a broad sense, this is called realism.”

Marso wrote realism next to Greece.

“Art history can be understood as the history of how painters used abstraction and realism, and which one they favored. When Christianity was strong, they used more abstract concepts, and when royal power was strong, they emphasized realistic elements.”

Marso saw Go-hoon, who was very annoyed. He was glaring at Marso, wondering if he had finished his painting.

“As time passed, each technique developed and new ones emerged, but if you keep these two concepts in your mind, you can easily approach them. Bring me what you painted.”

Marso wanted to explain abstraction and realism through Go-hoon’s painting.

Go-hoon’s painting, which enjoyed drawing abstract concepts based on realism, seemed to be a good example for the children.

Go-hoon reluctantly handed over the portrait he had drawn of Marso, and Marso frowned when he saw it.

He had depicted the skin like wood and put on a ridiculous hat.

The nose was so long that it looked like Pinocchio.5)

“What is this?”

“What do you mean?”

Go-hoon snapped back, furious that he had lied and used his position to make him paint.

“When did I lie?”

“You did. You said you wouldn’t lecture. You said you had no time.”

“I don’t!”

“Then why are you here! Did you come to exploit me?”

“That inspiration threatened me!”

The students were surprised when Henri Marso and Go-hoon suddenly started fighting.

They were confused as to why the two were arguing, and as they were, Nicolas Poussin, the principal, quietly approached and picked up the portrait and chuckled.

“What a wonderful portrait.”

The children looked at Marso, who looked like Pinocchio, and laughed together.

“Mr. Marso, you have to continue your lesson, right?”

“Damn it.”

Nicolas Poussin watched his student, who was grinning with the portrait that Go-hoon had drawn for him, with affection.

“It looks like you had a promise with Hoon.”

He had asked him to lecture because the students wanted to meet Henri Marso, but he seemed to have postponed his promise because he was preparing for the lecture over the weekend.

“Mind your own business.”

Marso took and got up.

“By the way, I have to ask you to teach art therapy, too.”

“What?”

Henri Marso narrowed his eyes at the words that he had to teach art therapy as well as art history.

But to Nicolas Poussin, he just looked cute.

“You’re old and the hospital keeps calling you, don’t they?”

“Do you think I’ll fall for it again?”

Marso recalled last Friday.

He said he was not feeling well, and that there was no one else to take the lecture, so he begged him to do it. But when he met him in person today, he was perfectly fine.

Poussin smiled faintly and looked at Marso.

“…Did you get the results?”

Poussin nodded.

“What did they say? Huh? What’s wrong with you?”

“They said I should get a retest.”

“It’s because something is wrong that you got a retest. What is it!”

“There’s no need to worry about something that’s not even certain.”

Poussin calmed Marso down and sighed softly.

“I just don’t know what to do with the art therapy class tomorrow. I can’t postpone the class because I’m going to the hospital.”

Marso’s temples throbbed.

“Other schools tell their students not to come when the teachers go on strike! It’s not for any other reason, it’s because they’re sick!”

“Can you do that?”

“Damn it. The others are doing whatever they want and only the inspiration is working!”

“Everyone is busy with their own work.”

Poussin sighed again.

“Come to think of it, it must be a burden for you, too. Don’t worry about it and go ahead. You can delay the test a little.”

“Don’t talk nonsense! Why delay the test!”

“Can’t you help it?”

Marso gritted his teeth.

The old benefactor was not feeling well, but he couldn’t go to the hospital with ease, and he was annoyed.

“I’ll do it for you, so get tested right away tomorrow. Got it?”

“No. No.”

“What do you mean no!”

Pusang was happy that his cute disciple finally decided to help him do a good deed.

Meanwhile.

“Heh heh.”

Gosuyeol laughed out loud when he heard from Ko Hun what had happened at school today.

“The principal is not ordinary either.”

“I was worried because I didn’t know if it was a prank or real.”

Who could refuse when an old teacher asked for a favor, saying he had to go to the hospital because he was sick?

Ko Hun understood Marso’s situation well.

“Well, he is old.”

“He looked fine on the outside.”

“They say when you get old, you hurt where you can’t see. It’s good to get regular check-ups even if you don’t have a serious illness.”

“Grandpa, are you healthy?”

“Of course. I’ll be healthy until I can play with my great-grandson.”

“Great-grandson?”

“Don’t you want to have kids when you get married?”

“I don’t want to get married.”

“What! Why!”

“I get unhappy when I meet someone.”

Gosuyeol couldn’t understand how his grandson, who was only eleven years old, could say that he would be unhappy if he met someone.

“Have you ever had a girlfriend?”

Ko Hun hesitated for a moment and lied. He didn’t want to tell his grandfather about his love life in his past life.

“I watch dramas. It was a drama story.”

“You kid, dramas are made to be fun. They make them tragic and complicated on purpose.”

Ko Hun nodded.

“You’re not watching those trashy. No. Those bad dramas, are you?”

“Of course not. I don’t watch them.”

Feeling a suspicious gaze, Ko Hun quickly changed the topic.

“I’m late. I have to meet Ralph.”

A parody of Kim Chae-won’s dialogue in episode 5 of the 2002 MBC drama .

, c. 1400 BCE, author unknown

, c. 1400 BCE, author unknown

, c. 450 BCE, a replica of Myron’s bronze sculpture.

Pinocchio, Carlo Collodi, 1883.