Yesterday I had to go to the drugstore. When I got there, a neighbor was getting out of the store and shouted: “Hey, where are the dogs?” I felt a little stupid answering: “They don’t like going to the drugstore! Hey! Hey!” Stupid question, stupid answer! People are so used to see us, Mathieu and I, with the Gemini (Yes! They’re called Castor and Pollux! Cute, isn’t it?); in our hometown, we are known as the “guys with the dogs”: great for the ego! I should admit that we’re always with our “babies” (two huge Labradors, 100 pounds each, no fat, all muscle, 3 years old but still acting like puppies, combined IQ: 10,5); if there is somewhere we can’t go with the dogs, we don’t go. Something we can’t do with them, we just don’t do it!
They really are master mischief-makers. I could spend a whole day telling people about the time Castor grabbed one of Mathieu’s orchids, the 60$ one of course, and started to run around the backyard with the wounded plant in his mouth… with Mathieu following and screaming! Or the time he chewed on one of our friend’s eyeglasses. Or the time Pollux ripped open four or five garbage bags in less than two seconds. Every morning they start their day with a good “fight” growling and barking and then, they start spinning around until we are outside, ready or not, for their mega-ball-game of the day. Cute, isn’t it? At least, that’s how people react when we tell those events. Cute? Are you sure? Afterwards, maybe! But when you have to bring to your friend a pile of brooken glass with twisted metal and chewed-on plastic, you don’t find it that… cute!
People tend to romanticize things they don’t live but would secretly like to experience. That’s what they generally do when they talk about an artist’s passion. Isn’t it romantic to think about young Rimbaud struggling with life, with his ambiguous sexuality, walking around the world wearing nothing but torn clothes and smoking that long pipe of his, as we can see him in Total Eclipse starring Leonardo DiCaprio? It reminds me of another wonderful film retelling, this time, the life of Camille Claudel: it’s called Camille Claudel, and it’s from director Bruno Nuytten with Isabelle Adjani as Camille Claudel and Gérard Depardieu as Rodin. It’s a great film that perfectly depicts what artistic passion really is. Nothing romantic there. Just pure and simple passion, pure and simple obsession, more pain than gratification, love that hurts, art that takes all the place, sometimes joyful art, most of the time painful art. Passion. Real passion. True passion. In real life, artistic passion is anything but romantic; artistic passion is never cute: artistic passion is a never-ending struggle with an ever-present but invisible invader. Artistic passion makes you “eat, sleep, shit, live, breathe, cry, love, fuck, dream and kiss Art” as we can read on the latest of Patrick’s posters.
Artistic passion is a tragedy like those we can see in Ancient Greek plays. A man, alone, as weak as every man can be, is constantly fighting against a power much more powerful than he can ever imagine. A man living a life he didn’t decide to live. In those plays, the man never wins. The invisible power is always much too powerful. No man can fight such an enemy.
Passion is never… “sooo cute”! Passion is what makes real art; but, in the end, passion always wins.
If you love an artist, do whatever you can to help him as you should, knowing very well neither one of you will win the fight.
Simply love…
Comeau
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