“Little Shishi, if you don’t mind me saying, you can always just ignore him but you shouldn’t mess around with your paintings. Even when we paint casually for fun, our concepts should still be comprehensive and reasonable. Being too free form could affect your future work.”
Lao Lui sighed after watching her for a little while.
“Look at your scenery. What season is that? Why is there snow in the mountain but hibiscus in this woman’s hair?
“And, why would there be such an elaborate structure in such a remote area? The girl was dressed fancily but why was the guy in such fancy clothes when he was getting water? This mades no sense!”
Lao Lui couldn’t help but frowned and grumbled.
“Yeah, are you just slapping random things together? What is this inside the lake? And why does your sun look exactly like the moon? As elegant as your painting is, but that’s still not going to work…”
He was half way through talking when Gao Xiu-e, standing next to him, smacked him with a paintbrush.
“What? Was I wrong?”
Lao Lui’s eyes widened uncontrollably.
Gao Xiu-e gave him a you-are-so-stupid look. “Lao Lui, I know you are no spring chick but don’t you think you should try and educate yourself a little more?”
“Huh?”
Lao Lui was taken aback a little, then immediately felt wronged when he saw everyone around him giving him mocking looks.
“What? Do you not agree with me?”
President Huang Chuan gave him a profound look.
If he had goatee on him, he would even stroke it to make himself appear more like an oracle.
“Have you never heard of flowers in mirrors and moon a lake?”
Lao Lui’s eyes widened and, after a long while, he finally slammed himself on his thigh and had it all figured out!
“Flowers being applied in the mirror and a moon reflected on the surface of a lake. I get it now. Flowers in mirrors and reflection of moon. That means nothing in the painting are real?!”
Gao Xiu-e narrowed her eyes and put on her bifocal lens. Pointing at the painting, she said, “Other than the erratic seasons and characters, look over at this patch of bamboos around this little path and then look at the pattern on the water bucket that this man is carrying. This is a bucket made out of bamboo! Trying to fill a bamboo bucket with water – everything is all for naught!”
Huang Chuan too, smiled and stuck his head over. “Even the way she painted the mountains suggested they were reflections of each other. They may look different in size but it was the mounting, but mirror image of each other, which was why we felt that they looked odd.”
All Lao Lui could do now was to bring up one of his fingers at Gu Shishi. “Little Shishi, this is awesome. I bow down to you!”
Gu Shishi smiled. She dipped some more water and colored the mountains.
That was right. This painting might appear complete; its strokes smooth, concise, and well meant. In reality, everything was illusory and elusive from the very beginning. They were nothing more than illusions that would never come true!
From the bamboo forest to the man and woman, to the house, the lake, and the mountains… anyone with knowledge in the field would be able to call out what was wrong with it if they give it a careful look.
So Gu Jiangxin wanted a painting, right?
She would give him one then!
No, she would sell him one for 300 million yuan!
Sometimes, he shouldn’t just expect that everything would go his way!
When she told him two hours, most of the time was spent waiting for the ink to dry.
The actual painting time was a lot shorter than that.
By the time Gu Shishi was done, she had already told the roomful of grandmas and grandpas her story. Some of them widened their eyes and blew onto their beard in anger and disbelief and some even had reddened eyes.
By the time Gu Jiangxin returned for the painting, he noticed the mockery in the way the elderlies were looking at him.
He was just about to think about what was wrong when an old lady with a headful of white hair brought a painting over, holding it with both hands.
