| Like for most kids, painting initially
became for me an extension of fingers dipped in something greasy and then
wiped on walls. The effect was overpoweringly strong, for it evoked not
only subconscious longings to express the creativity hidden away somewhere
inside me, but it also evoked sudden expostulations from my mother I had
heretofore not experienced. I figured that the impact I had made ought
to be exploited, and so I continued practicing my talents, albeit afterwards
restricted to paper and canvas. My work was primitive and without instruction,
other than through "how-to-do-it" books and a brief quarter of Art in high
school with a delightful teacher named Miss Foos. These were the seeds,
along with an occasional foray into art museums and galleries, but I was
a slow grower, and drawing and painting were little else than spotted hobbies,
things to do when everything else had dried up.
It wasn't until 1988 that I took painting more seriously. At the time, I was living in Santiago, Chile, and a chance conversation with my neighborhood bread and sundries provider led me to Roberto Hayashi, a local artist of Chilean-Japanese background who lived a mere three blocks from my house. Together with his lovely wife Rocío López, whose father was a well-known Chilean painter (and who, well into his 90s, continued to paint every day), Roberto welcomed me into his home and studio and exposed me to a whole new and exciting world. That very Saturday I began my first formal
classes in oil painting. My fellow-students ranged from five to ninety
years of age, from academics to the mentally retarded, from housewives
to students to doctors to scientists to airline pilots, from health freaks
to rehabilitating outpatients to the terminally ill, from the devoutly
religious to the devoutly profane, from natives to foreign-born, from conservatives
to communists. It was an amazing hodge-podge of humanity, and despite our
differences, we had two things in common: we wanted to paint and we adored
Roberto and Rocío.
I promised this would be brief, and so
it shall. Suffice to say that I owe a great deal to this wonderful painter
and human being. Not only was he endlessly patient and filled with good
humor, he was a great teacher and a tireless promoter of our humble efforts.
He and his dear wife went out of their way to provide a warm and accepting
environment for each of us, and to see that our work was exhibited. A showing
was really overwhelmingly exciting for us, and the warm reception from
the public could only be thanks to Roberto Hayashi's
encouragement and dedication.
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