Portrait of the Artist as a Young Boy

It has been some time since Kaia and I have spent the afternoon painting. Indicative of the speed in which this time in India has sped by, while I hadn’t thought it was so long, it turns out that it was nearly a year ago—last May, that we took up the brush together. Since that time, of course, he has enjoyed painting at Kids Central and brought home a number of pieces, including the work at left of “snakes eating olives”. Yesterday I decided to break out the painting stuff because his nap only lasted 30 minutes and we needed some fun stuff to do inside during the heat of the afternoon. As we were taking the various brushes and jars out (and he was literally jumping up and down with excitement saying “painting! painting!”) I was really impressed with how much he’d changed since the last time we’d painted. Whereas the last time he was wielding the brush with blunt strokes, this time he was very gentle with his dips and even knew how to take excess paint off by using the edge of the paint jar. When I asked him where he learned to do this, he laughed and said, “At Kids C papa!”

He really seems to love his painting, but where it became really fun for him was when I let him dip his hands into the paint. I assume that they don’t take this reckless approach at Kids Central for obvious reasons, but it was really fun to watch him explore the sensation of paint on his hands and how he could make his mark. Once he learned that he could make his mark all over his body, it was all downhill from there. I kept thinking about Arrested Development and Tobias’ Blue Man Group hand print all over the Bluth model or the boy-sized Incredible Hulk as he was slathering himself in the “ink”, giggling all the way. It was really funny. Closer to home, it reminded me a bit of Holi, the festival of color—well, at least if he had a few more hues to paint himself with. Anyway, what it all resulted in was a really fun piece of art that will adorn our walls for years to come. Still he hasn’t given it a name, so we’re just calling it “snakes eating Kaia’s hand” for now.

Why I Love this Time: The routine of going to the nearby temple at dusk.