It took me a long time to convince myself to submit my paintings to an art gallery. I always looked at gallerists, artists, visitors, and art critics with a cynical lens. However, several of my close friends insisted that I should communicate more with the outside world. I need to get out of the quiet corner of my painting studio more and submit my paintings to galleries.
*
I reached Bloor Street. I parked the car in a multi-story parking lot. The rain was still saturating the city as hard as possible. I was afraid that the paintings would get wet. I opened my big umbrella. I hugged the paintings and put them under the umbrella. I had to protect them from the rain like my children. I walked along Bloor Street and entered Yorkville Street through a side street that resembled the corridors of the old neighborhoods of Constantinople. On the other side of the street, I saw an art gallery. I hurried to the gallery. Opened the door and threw myself into the gallery.
*
When I entered the gallery, my eyes lost their ability to see for a few moments. I entered a pile of darkness and cigarette smoke from the rainy, humid, and cloudy street. It took a few moments for my pupils to dilate enough to distinguish the paintings, chairs, and tables inside the gallery. It is as if no one has opened the door of the gallery for years and the cigarette smoke has condensed there so much that it has become a solid object that surrounds the entire space inside the gallery. The sound of scat could be heard from outside. No other sound could be heard in the gallery. The smell of cigarettes was combined with the smell of dampness and a certain type of wall mold. It smelled so sharp that I could not breathe easily.
I found my way through the small corridor in front of the gallery and among the piles of small and large paintings and old books and crumpled newspapers that were scattered on the floor in a disorderly manner to reach the end of the gallery. I was looking for the owner of the gallery to show him my paintings. But it seems that the gallery was abandoned for centuries. I passed by a large painting hanging on the wall. The painting caught my attention. A giant black cat was sitting in the corner of an old masonry house and staring at the audience with mysterious and scary eyes. The bricks of the house were separated from the facade one by one and were scattered on the ground around the black cat. The house and the cat were buried in a large amount of black and gray paint on the canvas. The black cat reminded me of Samuel. Samuel was my father's cat. The gloomy black cat that spent mornings and nights next to my father in the basement where my father used to live...
*
One spring day when I was a lonely and somewhat brooding fifteen-year-old girl, I made up my mind to get my father out of that dark and dank basement. To convince him to come out with me and walk together in the cherry orchard behind our house. Take my hands, hug me, and caress my hair. For once, give me a few seconds of a father's love.
I entered my father's lonely cave. Samuel was lying on the floor next to the door and was looking at the endless hours with boredom. My father's lonely cave was always full of cigarette smoke. I found a winding path through the maze of books and knick-knacks left on the basement floor to get to my father's desk. My father had noticed my arrival. But he did not even raise his head to see me. He was sitting at the desk. He was smoking. And he was writing one of those thousand-page novels with his special fountain pen on the paper. In the end of his novels, the character of the novel cut his wrist with a razor blade or throws himself down from the top of a mountain.
I stood next to his table. I looked at my father's face. The flickering light of the desk lamp cast a bright shadow on his face. His white moustache covered all his lips. His white hair was scattered on his forehead. His face was like a crumpled paper full of wrinkles. Inhaling and exhaling, his wheezing sound broke the silence of the basement. I put my hand on his right hand that was writing. I stopped him from writing. I told him all the things that had been in my heart for several months. I told him that he should get out of this gray and dark life. He should spend time with his family, with his daughter. He should pay attention to his child. He cannot drown himself in this swamp of depression and marsh of his endless writings. That his chronic depression has taken over his life and his daughter's life like cancer cells. That I need my father to hold my hands, hug me, caress me, and walk with me through the cherry orchard.
My father listened to all my words while lowering his head. The parts of his face were completely numb and did not make even a slight movement. There was no emotion on his face. He listened to my words in silence. The only sound I could hear was his deep wheezing. When I finished speaking, I remained silent. I was waiting for my answer. A glimmer of hope was shining in my heart. Maybe my words will impress him and make the path of his life change. Get out of the gray and damp world in which he was trapped. Take my hand and walk with me in the garden behind our house and look at the colorful cherry blossoms together.
With his left hand, he took a deep smoke on the cigarette. He shook his right hand from under my hand and pulled it out. He put his fountain pen on the table. He started talking to me without raising his head and looking at me. Contrary to the fact that he had so many words and stories to write in those endless novels, he rarely speaks to me. He put the “no” answer in a few short sentences and handed it to me. That he can't and doesn't want to get out of that cave dwelling, from cigarette smoke and from the scary world of his novels. Break away from the imaginary characters of his stories and enter the life full of color and freshness that is flowing among the cherry trees. That his gray world does not have a way to a colored world outside the basement and will not have.
I swallowed my sadness. I came out from the basement. When I was closing the door, I saw Samuel, who gave me a half look with indifference and stared at the wall again. I closed the door. The cool spring breeze hit the tears on my face and made my face cold...
*
I passed by the black cat painting inside the gallery. It was as if some unknown painter had painted Samuel and then left the painting to that dark and musty gallery on Yorkville Street. I turned my head and saw a small desk at the back corner of the gallery. A thin old man was sitting at the desk. He was the owner of the gallery. I went to him. On the way, my eyes had some brief accidents with some other paintings in the gallery. All of them were as dark and black and gray and lifeless as the cat and masonry house painting.
I arrived in front of the desk. The owner of the gallery was reading a thick book and smoking a cigarette. He had white and distressed hair. His face was full of wrinkles and drops of sweat were hanging from his forehead.
I told the owner of the gallery that I want to display some of my works in his gallery. He indifferently told me to show him the paintings. I took my children out of the newspapers I had wrapped around them and placed them on the table. He looked at my paintings for a few seconds. Then he turned his eyes and stared at the tiny words in the thick book. As if the colorful and happy colors that flowed in my paintings had hurt his eyes. As if after being imprisoned in a dark solitary confinement for several years, suddenly comes to the prison yard and wants to look at the sunlight.
He was silent for a few seconds. I was waiting for him to say his opinion about my work. Finally, he started to speak. He summed up his opinion with extreme frugality in just a few short sentences. That the quality of my work is high. But my paintings are very colorful. That I should reduce the variety of colors in my works. That I should use gray and black colors more than vivid colors in my paintings. That the world is not as colorful and happy as my paintings show.
*
I wrapped the newspapers around my happy children again to protect them from the soulless eyes of the old man and the raindrops of Yorkville Street. I went as fast as possible to the exit door of the gallery and threw myself out of that black and gray world surrounded by cigarette smoke, humidity and wall mold. I drove home as fast as I could. I wanted to get myself to my studio and start painting.
*
I entered my studio. I put a large canvas on a tripod. I poured a large amount of acrylic paint from their tubes onto the palette and mixed them with a brush. I started to paint. I wanted to paint life with all its beauty and colors on canvas. I wanted to fight the black and gray world. I wanted to free myself, my soul, and my canvas from blackness, cigarette smoke, and solitude.
*
I was painting all night until I fell asleep on the floor next to the canvas. The next day’s morning I woke up at ten o'clock. I looked at my painting. I got excited from looking at the various colors and patterns I drew on the canvas during the night hours. I came out of the studio. I opened the door of the house and entered the alley. Toronto's five-day rain was over. The sun was shining in the sky. The sparrows were chirping. The trees had colorful blossoms. I saw a little girl holding her father's hand and they were walking on the sidewalk. I started walking in the endless tree-lined alleys of our neighborhood. I was breathing deeply. The sun was on my face and it made me more beautiful than ever. I wanted to live and enjoy this colorful world.