Invisible Ink | Previous Challenge Entry

how it works

TITLE: Invisible Ink | Previous Challenge Entry
By Marlene Bonney
01/18/17
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The artist splayed colors across the expansive canvas, smudging here and there for added effect. This would be yet another work his fans would recognize and heartily recommend to all who searched for the biggest and best the world had to offer. Like a budding novice, he accepted their homage with gratitude, but did not demand it like most successful entrepreneurs. Most of his creations were even unsigned, so that volumes of antiquities were published to help admirers recognize them.

Fame and fortune were not his goals, so obtaining an interview was as illusive an effort as imitating his style. Matching his bold or muted hues remained a challenge to students of the arts as they honed their talents. Still lifes or live portraits, none could compare to his originals so that many gave up along the way because they could not compete with his exquisite pieces. Michelangelo, Picasso, Rembrandt or even Van Gogh only scratched the surfaces with their creations which could, in turn, be as subtle or as bold as each depiction required. Anyone who wanted to be anyone in this field studied his works with great interest. Like strutting peacocks, they signed their pieces with graceful flourishes or scribbled initials for added effect. Yet, his were the most sought after; theirs, mere caricatures.

News broadcasters and commentators and critics picked apart his works like buzzards eating their prey. Displaying them through various forms of media, both social and televised, they also searched far and wide for a physical introduction to this famous artist. He was an enigma to them, a mysterious master illustrator of superior genius who, apparently, wanted anonymity. Contrarily, those who knew him personally were trying, but with limited success, to give the public this sought-after introduction. It continued to be a sore point with the powerful, elite, or more educated pillars of society that the low-income, simple and uneducated people, or even children, were more apt to be granted time in this coveted personage’s presence.

I have the privilege of knowing this painter personally, which gives me an edge over many other art students or seekers because he is my dad. I am able to recognize all of his productions at a glance, so superior they are to counterfeits. But, even I cannot capture all the nuances on my own canvases. Only his, unbranded and supreme, are the true originals. I asked him once why he didn’t sign his works.

“My child, if people do not recognize me by the miracles of nature that they can smell and see and touch and hear, my physically written signature would not make them believe. They would continue their ignorance because they are blinded by their own ambitions and by taking all of my creations for granted. They have become jaded by years of familiarity with my universe.”

“This is very sad,” my downcast eyes pools of unshed tears welling up like a threatening volcano, “I cannot understand such foolishness. Perhaps they can be convinced if we who know you personally reveal your authorship to them.”

To this end, believers held camp meetings, evangelists held revivals, and churches proclaimed my Father’s presence and existence. Some were converted and became, like myself, His children. But most were too puffed up in their own consequence to accept the simple gift of knowing Him and depended on their good works to get them to heaven. . .

The wealthy, the affluent and elite, and collectors purchase other artists’ renditions of my Father’s original compositions, but fail to discern Him in the miraculous creation of the world they live in. Believers see Him everywhere. A rainbow stretched across a sunny, rain-drenched horizon; the velvety petal of a full-bloomed pansy; the star-studded night sky; a glorious sunrise or sunset, a chameleon of blending purples, oranges, reds and yellows; the prairie’s grasses waffling in God’s fragrant breath; the fluffy white clouds dissipating like pulled apart cotton balls; the wondrous innocence and joy of a baby’s smile, or unconditional love personified in God’s children by their actions—all stamped with the signature of God by their very existence.

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