“You can rise to that height as soon as you shall have become a true artist.”
“You had become one, then.”
“But the police sniffing is more than I can bear.”
“There, there, you are at it again. Look at that Nami-san of the hot spring hotel. She was tormented by all kinds of worrying thoughts on coming home to her father after being divorced from her husband, until she at last came to me, asking me, to free her from her mental anguish. I have been training her in the holy teaching, and she is now mastering herself wonderfully. You have seen yourself what a highly rational young woman she is.”
“Yes, yes, I have thought she is a woman of no ordinary culture, Osho-san.”
“Indeed, she is not. A few years ago I had under me a young disciple named Taian. She saved him from walking off the narrow path, and he is now on a fair way to attain high priesthood.”
XII
It was Oscar Wilde, if I remember right, who said that Jesus of Nazareth was highly possessed of an artist’s gifts. I do not know much about Christ; but I shall not hesitate to pronounce that the priest, Daitetsu of Kaikanji, is full well-qualified for an appreciation of this kind. Not that he takes much interest in art, nor that he is well versed in such things. He is enviably content with a production which can hardly be called a picture, and is innocent enough to think that there should be the Doctor of Painting! Nevertheless, he is well-qualified to be an artist. He is like a bag without a bottom: everything passes through him freely. No impurities stagnate within him. Only give him a touch of humour, and he shall be at home with everything he comes across, everywhere he goes, and will thus make a perfect artist.
As for myself, I shall never be a true artist as long as I cannot get over my annoyance with being sniffed at by detectives. I may sit before my easel and take up my palette, but that will not make me an artist. I can assume myself to be a real artist only when I come to a mountainous countryside like Nakoi and drink full of the joys of Spring. Once in this state of emancipation, all the beauties of nature become mine and I have made myself a first-class artist, even though I may not paint the smallest picture. I may not equal Michelangelo in art and take my hat off to Raphael in skill; but I acknowledge no inferiority in me by the side of the great masters of the past and present in the personality of an artist. I have not painted a single picture since I came here. I may look to have brought with me my colour-box, merely to satisfy a whim, and people may laugh at me as an imitation. Let them laugh; I am none the less a real artist, a sterling artist. It is not that one on this psychological height necessarily produces great works; but I hold that an artist who can turn out a worthy painting must have passed through that stage.
Thus I thought as I drew at a cigarette after breakfast. The sun had mounted high above the haze, and I saw the green of the trees standing out in relief with uncommon clearness in the back mountain when I opened the shoji.
The relations of air, and objects with colour are to me always the most interesting study in this universe. Work out atmosphere by giving first importance to colour, or let air be subordinate to the object, or weave colour and objects into atmosphere, all kinds of tune may be given to a picture, each depending upon a delicate variation in treatment. It goes without saying that this tune shows differently according to the particular tastes and fancies of individual artists, just as it is natural that it is influenced by time and place. There was never, for instance, a bright picture of scenery, painted by an Englishman. It may be that they are not fond of bright pictures; but even if they are, they cannot do anything with the atmosphere they have in England. Goodall is an Englishman; but the tune of colour is quite different in his productions. He never took any scenery in his own country for his theme. He chose for his picture the scenery of Egypt or Persia, where the atmosphere is much clearer than in England. Those who see his paintings for the first time wonder how an Englishman could bring out colours so clearly; so brightly are they all finished.
As for individual taste, there can be no help for it. However, if it be our object to paint Japanese scenery, we must work out a colour and atmosphere peculiar to Japan. French paintings are good; but you cannot call it a picture of Japanese scenery which is produced by simply copying their colours. You must come in contact with nature on the spot, studying, morning and evening, the shape and colour of the clouds, the shade of haze, etc., being ever prepared to go out with your tripod, the moment you see a colour which you think just right. Colour in nature is to be seen but momentarily, and once missed the same colour will not be easily caught again. The mountain I was looking at was full of a colour which was a rare good fortune for an artist to come across. I could not afford to miss it, and I started to go into the mountain to make a copy of it.
I left my room through a side fusuma way and stepped out into the verandah. The same moment my eyes caught the figure of Nami-san, leaning against
