What is the meaning of the naked piano player? Remember the naked guy playing at the beginning of episodes of Monty Python’s Flying Circus? I had a friend who painted a naked boy playing piano in high school art class. He was a band geek. He later proved to be gay. I asked him why he painted that. He said, “That’s me being creative.”
My oldest son is now in the Marine Corp boot camp at San Diego. He says in his first letter home that things are going great. He was a self-taught piano player. He played beautiful music, including classical pieces by Mozart, by ear. He even composed his own music. That was him being creative. So, why did he want to become a Marine and be regimented and told what to do?
Before I started this crazy naked-piano-player drawing, I had a dream. I was performing in front of an audience, naked. I should’ve been embarrassed out of my old mind. But I wasn’t. I think it was because that was me being creative. Sometimes total randomness and surprise is creativity. Definitely being completely open and honest with the audience, being naked, if you will, is being creative.
So here is the start of another colored pencil Paffooney project. I think I will call it, “Baring the Creative Soul.”
I will keep you posted on my colored-pencil progress. This is just the initial sketch in graphite. It does not mean I am contemplating learning piano, or deciding I have suddenly become gay after 57 years. It means, “This is me being creative.”
Catch a Falling Star 