Wheat Field with Cypresses

The time was a Tuesday and a sunny day to take a trip down to The Met. I had gone a few weeks prior but stayed amongst the towering Greek and Roman statues sketching the contours of their perfected bodies. The overwhelming scale of the museum meant that I could only visit a portion of it each time. Today, I wandered through Rodin and into the immense collection of precious European Art.

I saw him from across the hall and immediately felt a pull towards him. He glimpsed at me under the old museum lighting, colors brilliantly glimmering. I decided to play against my desire to approach him; leaving the best for last, instigating an intriguing game of cat and mouse. For now, I remained unsure as to who held more control. I moved through the other galleries and lingered at each canvas, paying my respects for the appropriate minute. I faced Cézanne and Picasso, nodded and respectfully acknowledged. Each work possessed a beauty of its own, I imagine, but my mind was distracted by the alluring game I had subscribed to. So I passed along with urgency.

My heart beat anxiously as I finally entered into his space with a sense of extraordinary arrival. I avoided the tempt of his gaze; to be present for a moment with another. I focused on the lilies ahead of me bathing in the sunlight and the clouds that reflected purple hues along the water’s surface. Captured by Monet for three or four minutes, I immersed myself in pastel and maybe even came close to relieving my racing mind from thinking about what was waiting for me on the adjacent wall. The moments passed and my eyes pulled away without hesitation, rather easily. Finally, I locked eyes with him. I had arrived. There he is was before me. The cheeky game had drawn to its finale and I was immediately aware of my inferiority. Van Gogh stood before me.

He was a scene of Southern France on what felt like a Sunday morning in the early beginning of autumn. My gaze​ followed the grass as it swayed in the delicate breeze that also propelled the clouds into a whirlwind. The dazzling greens and yellows lined the Earth and a myriad of whites and blues swirled about the horizon. The movement drew apart the rusted hay and revealed red petals hiding behind the yellow, reclaiming a sense of joy amidst the Fall. I stepped into it. There was a path between the stalks and my heart began to follow it. The air was crisp and getting colder in the September month. But the sun still shone and kissed my forehead. I walked down barefoot. The ground was soft underneath me so I sank a little with each step; the Earth as if beckoning to keep me. Blades of taller grass brushed against my arms and tickled my skin with a playful humour. Behind the gentle, towering cypress, the rolling hills faded the line between the ground and the heavens. And above, the sky blanketed me from a distance, securing me in the atmosphere for just a little longer. It was almost silent. I heard only the rustling leaves and the dancing shadows which played a delicate tune just for me. The wind slowed to a meditative breathing. I stopped strolling and the stillness overtook me. It was as if my body no longer existed, my heartbeat blended with the melody, and my mind trailed with the clouds. I was one with beauty and longer human at all.​

​Refreshed by the breath of plein air, the path disappeared around me. I regained awareness of my being and I was back in the gallery space. I had no sense of how much time had gone by. It could have been a fleeting instance or an hour of standing there. Regardless, it was a feeling I could treasure for a lifetime. The painting remained elegantly hung in front of me.

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I don't believe I ever had such an emotional response to a painting. I always called myself an artist—a creator—with a great respect and appreciation for traditional art, but it seems as though I may have never really understood it before now.

Maybe it is because I am a painter that I feel the oil glide along the canvas as if I had shared his grip on the tool? Each stroke is clearly defined by the pressure of the brush and the thickened edges of the paint appear still wet from the tube. Maybe it is because I am an artist and an avid reader of its history that I sense his aggression and feelings of total release? For him, this was a refuge from the Parisian clutter and the chaos encircling his mind. Maybe it is because I am one to immerse myself in nature that I could see the strokes animate themselves into wondrous bloom, and smell the air from Arles while standing in the heart of New York City? Or maybe it is simply because I am present and that I am human and so I understand.

My knees weakened in front of this picture and I forgot to breathe. I saw the scene with all my senses; I shared his eyes and time of day. I felt the ache in his heart through the brilliance of color and his sincerity in the most natural way he formed the clouds. I would not claim to know him, but in those moments, there was no mystery to who he was and my heart tears at the memory of him that I missed on being a part of.