Photo of how I feel after I am ‘done’ writing
From Still Sundays:
On Friday evening I visited the Philadelphia Museum of Art and was mesmerized by this amazing sculpture. I am sure most people who visit there often are quite used to it and hence could and couldn’t understand my state of awe. I took many photos and I felt none captured how I was actually feeling when I saw it. I gave up and in my silence contemplated why I was so drawn to it. I thought about it rest of the night and then while listening to a group of percussion drummers outside an art gallery in downtown Philly it finally clicked. That sculpture is precisely how I feel after I am done writing—be it a paragraph for fiction that traces the thoughts which usually defy conforming to the mold of words or after I am done writing Sunday mornings or an email which states exactly how I feel or a hand written letter to a friend and so and so forth. That sculpture captures how I feel about the written word: words are a bow and an arrow.
Here is the statue of Diana, daughter of Jupiter, equated with Artemis (I am more familiar with the story of Artemis than Diana—in fact my very first email account when email was first introduced was Artemis followed by some digits), created by the famous sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens. Of course I knew none of this when I sat there hypnotized by this statute.
Falling in love is some recognizing.
More information on the sculpture is here.
I have some other photos from my adventures in Philly this weekend which I will share later as time allows.
~a.q.s.
This figure also reminded me of the last scene in Jean Cocteau’s film “La Belle et La Bete”: in Diana’s Pavilion the statue comes to life and makes short work of Avenant, the handsome suitor, who has invaded her domain. Her arrow reveals his beastly nature, and frees the “Beast” from his curse. ~lucy