Patrick Hartigan: My Neighbour is a Painter

My Neighbour is a Painter
I have a new neighbour, he is a painter. He drives a ute containing all the equipment (paint tins, ladders, tools, drop sheets, and so on) needed to paint people’s homes. I recently discovered that he also paints paintings – large, thick and vibrant oil paintings. Some days I can hear him in the back garden - belonging to the block of four flats we both live in – assembling his large canvases. Firstly drilling and attaching the frame (four stretcher bars), then stretching and stapling on the canvas using a staple gun.

Initially he was painting inside, in the small room directly beneath my own studio. I would be sitting at my desk drawing or staring out the window when I would become aware of the very distinctive smell of oil paint. And then, if I listened very carefully, I could hear his paintbrush touching the canvas. These hours of listening and smelling continued until, one day, he started painting in the front yard (a small square plot of lawn beneath my bedroom window and adjacent to the footpath). L saw him first; she said “the guy from downstairs is painting in the front garden and some of the neighbours are stopping to have a look.” I looked out and saw a canvas on an easel. His palette was resting on the row of mailboxes and on the ground beneath were various bottles of painting chemicals. Sometimes he would pick the palette up and hold it in his left hand whilst painting.

Some of the more curious neighbours stopped and asked him questions such as “I really like that, what’s it of?” or “Do you paint for a living?” One man, who was dropping in to feed the goldfish of another neighbour on holidays, stood and watched for some time before saying “I don’t really understand art … but I like that.” Most of the time he was very receptive to the curious onlookers and seemed only too happy to comment on his paintings, “That’s a waterfall,” “That’s a wave I’m painting for my friend who’s a surfer” … and so on.

I watched him with great curiosity over the following four or five days as he pushed and scraped the paint about, sometimes pacing backwards to get a ‘broader view.’ Back and forth he went, with brushes in hands and pockets, until one day he packed up and moved back inside.

Only several weeks following those days on the front lawn did he re-emerge (beyond the occasional whiff of oil paint), though this time in the back garden. The other day whilst sitting in my kitchen and staring out the (rear) window I became roused by the sounds of him preparing and stapling a canvas – an activity which I then proceeded to observe and video record via a neighbouring window’s reflection.

My neighbour has a fat, black cat. I sometimes give this cat milk and, of late, have allowed it to wander into my flat.

On arriving home today I noticed the cat as soon as I turned into my street; it was sitting outside our block of flats, waiting for somebody to come home. When it recognised me it started towards me and as I got nearer I could see its mouth meowing (before I could hear it). When I arrived at the front door it placed itself in front of me and continued meowing. It ran up the stairs in anticipation of me giving it some milk. I opened my front door and it followed me in. I walked through to the back door and let it out. I didn’t give it milk because I didn’t have any milk.

A few weeks ago I watched the cat as it sat on the front lawn. Its owner was painting on the same lawn as the cat sat behind him yawning, scratching and licking itself.

I also encounter the cat in the backyard. Usually it’s lying asleep, or half asleep, in a shady section next to the fence. When it sees me it sometimes comes towards me and rubs itself against my leg, and I sometimes respond by patting it. It will sometimes go to sleep in my shadow after I sit down. Then, when I go to return upstairs, it will usually follow me and wait for some milk. I have a saucer outside my front door and another one outside my back door. The one I originally had at the front door was broken by my other neighbour. Before I knew what had happened (she claims to have accidentally stepped on it in the darkness), it sat there broken for several days and I found myself pondering the possibility of the cat somehow smashing it.

The first cat I ever had was a Siamese cat called Piewacket. This was a very sad and moody cat which didn’t like to interact with people. The death of this cat – the scene of its very sudden death – remains glowing in my mind with great drama. I was about six or seven years old at the time and I was standing outside my family’s house with my parents late one night saying goodbye to a departing guest. Piewacket was standing around and then started leaping about in an uncharacteristically happy manner. We all watched with surprise as it had its fun and we reflected on the strangeness of its happiness. Then I watched as it jumped really high and came down on its head and snapped its neck. It died instantly, its dead eyes staring up at me. It was the first death I had ever encountered and I still can’t quite believe that Piewacket is dead.

Since then I’ve had several cats and lived in many places where other people’s cats hang around. I would say that I am fond of cats but not quite what some people refer to as a cat person.

On a windy Sunday morning I looked out my bedroom window and saw my neighbours ute. At that moment he emerged onto the footpath carrying some painted canvases which he leant against a small tree. He then went back inside to get several more which he stacked against the first ones. I watched as he gathered perhaps twelve canvases, all different in size and depicting various subjects including a vase of roses, an ocean with some rocks, and a forest. I expected him to load them into his ute as I’d seen him do before; instead, he placed a small cardboard placard inscribed ‘FREE’ in bold red writing, in front of the stack of paintings. He then walked back inside.

From my window I wondered “is he giving up painting?” or “is he simply wanting to give people his paintings rather than hold onto them, or try to sell them for hundreds (or thousands) of dollars?” I also noticed the weather beginning to turn, a storm coming maybe, and I briefly envisaged the paintings in the rain.

Each of the visible paintings were done in the distinctive thick brushstrokes I had noticed in his other works which had rested or been executed in the front and back lawns over the past months. A small section of a work directly contrasting the others of a wintry landscape in a decorative frame, could be seen poking out towards the back of the stack. The other seven or so works were hidden from view.

The stack stood there against the small, windy tree, and I wondered whether this was something to be sad about.

An occasional pedestrian appeared, walking the dog or pushing a pram. One dog tried to take a pee on the stack but was whisked away by its owner. The paintings went largely unnoticed, except when a person would look at the sign and momentarily consider the significance of such a thing, before moving on. Maybe this was because it was Sunday morning and people were tired or maybe they were simply confused by such a thing. I stood and watched each passer-by respond to the stack, unable to tear myself away from the window for fear I would miss something. I fetched a stool to sit on as I watched. I tried to get involved with other things needing to be done but within moments I found myself back at the window.

Several hours went by with no paintings being taken from the stack. In looking at and thinking about those paintings, in particular the intense red roses, I startled upon the word ‘pain’ in the word ‘painting.’

Later on some kids (perhaps six or seven years of age) were playing near the stack of paintings. They had various toys including a scooter, a ball and some plastic weapons. One minute they were kicking the ball and running after each other, the next minute stopping to have a duel with their swords or a shootout with their guns.

For fifteen minutes or so they ran past and around the stack without looking at it. Then one of the boys noticed the stack, then the sign, and yelled to his friend “look, it’s free” before giving the ocean canvas a big kick. He then returned to the game with the ball and seemed to forget all about the free paintings.

At seeing that boy kick the canvas I briefly rose from my stool before resettling and pondering the relationship between the word FREE and the canvas being kicked.

Another ten or fifteen minutes lapsed with their high energy playing and fighting before the other boy saw the stack after hiding from his friend directly behind it. He then walked to the front of the paintings to have a look and, when seeing the FREE sign, stabbed a canvas with his plastic sword, right in its middle, which was incidentally, the same ocean work kicked by his friend. In doing so I also noticed that he had stepped on the FREE sign (which now appeared face down). The stack was in a state of partial disarray. The kids then returned to fighting one another and were soon called home by a mother.

At that point I left the window and went to the kitchen to have some lunch…

Pretty soon I was back at the window and there I saw that the stack of paintings had been neatly put back together, this time with a bigger picture of some green trees to the front. The cardboard sign saying FREE was again face up. I wondered who had done this - Was it my neighbour? I then considered many other things such as “Was he watching the stack?” “Had he seen the boy stabbing his painting?” “Was he in the room below me watching the stack through a slit in the curtains?”

Except for the delivery of the works early that morning I never saw my neighbour over the course of that day.

By mid afternoon there was still no sign of paintings having been taken. The wind was blowing very hard by this stage and over the next few hours the front painting fell forward on two separate occasions. I was at the window for the most part of the day but inevitably got distracted with other things or went to the toilet, but on each occasion I returned to the window to find that the fallen paintings had been restacked. I could no longer see the wounded ocean painting but I thought I could see its left edge sticking out from behind the larger, now foregrounded, forest.

I watched the darkening clouds gather and felt certain a storm was about to begin. But it never did, those dark clouds moved by without shedding a single drop of rain. And as the day drew to a close I estimated that at least three works had been taken by the time it got dark. The movement obviously continued overnight because by the following morning there were only three remaining paintings – all, strangely enough, lying face down. The FREE sign, presumably, was lying beneath.

Wounded Ocean

Last night, while taking out the garbage via the side passage, I heard loud noises from the adjacent house. When I turned to look I could see a boy in his bedroom (painted bright blue), engaged in an imaginary duel with his plastic sword. From the noises he was making I knew immediately that it was the same boy who had stabbed my neighbour’s painting only days before.

I wheeled the bin onto the street before returning down the passage for the second bin. On walking back, past the boy’s room, I looked up and saw on his wall my neighbour’s wounded ocean painting.

I fetched the second bin which I wheeled out the front and placed beside the first bin.

(detail)

About a week ago my neighbour moved out. He told us he was building a house somewhere in the country on a cheap plot of land he’d found; he seemed happy. As yet nobody else has moved in and it’s kind of quiet all of a sudden – no more sounds of canvases being prepared (and painted on), or front lawn conversations about art. Also, no more cat expectantly following me upstairs.

	Patrick Hartigan My Neighbour is a Painter	ARTISTS - PROGRAM - ABOUT - HOME INFO@DARRENKNIGHTGALLERY.COM
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	My Neighbour is a Painter I have a new neighbour, he is a painter. He drives a ute containing all the equipment (paint tins, ladders, tools, drop sheets, and so on) needed to paint people’s homes. I recently discovered that he also paints paintings – large, thick and vibrant oil paintings. Some days I can hear him in the back garden - belonging to the block of four flats we both live in – assembling his large canvases. Firstly drilling and attaching the frame (four stretcher bars), then stretching and stapling on the canvas using a staple gun. Initially he was painting inside, in the small room directly beneath my own studio. I would be sitting at my desk drawing or staring out the window when I would become aware of the very distinctive smell of oil paint. And then, if I listened very carefully, I could hear his paintbrush touching the canvas. These hours of listening and smelling continued until, one day, he started painting in the front yard (a small square plot of lawn beneath my bedroom window and adjacent to the footpath). L saw him first; she said “the guy from downstairs is painting in the front garden and some of the neighbours are stopping to have a look.” I looked out and saw a canvas on an easel. His palette was resting on the row of mailboxes and on the ground beneath were various bottles of painting chemicals. Sometimes he would pick the palette up and hold it in his left hand whilst painting. Some of the more curious neighbours stopped and asked him questions such as “I really like that, what’s it of?” or “Do you paint for a living?” One man, who was dropping in to feed the goldfish of another neighbour on holidays, stood and watched for some time before saying “I don’t really understand art … but I like that.” Most of the time he was very receptive to the curious onlookers and seemed only too happy to comment on his paintings, “That’s a waterfall,” “That’s a wave I’m painting for my friend who’s a surfer” … and so on. I watched him with great curiosity over the following four or five days as he pushed and scraped the paint about, sometimes pacing backwards to get a ‘broader view.’ Back and forth he went, with brushes in hands and pockets, until one day he packed up and moved back inside. Only several weeks following those days on the front lawn did he re-emerge (beyond the occasional whiff of oil paint), though this time in the back garden. The other day whilst sitting in my kitchen and staring out the (rear) window I became roused by the sounds of him preparing and stapling a canvas – an activity which I then proceeded to observe and video record via a neighbouring window’s reflection. The Cat My neighbour has a fat, black cat. I sometimes give this cat milk and, of late, have allowed it to wander into my flat. On arriving home today I noticed the cat as soon as I turned into my street; it was sitting outside our block of flats, waiting for somebody to come home. When it recognised me it started towards me and as I got nearer I could see its mouth meowing (before I could hear it). When I arrived at the front door it placed itself in front of me and continued meowing. It ran up the stairs in anticipation of me giving it some milk. I opened my front door and it followed me in. I walked through to the back door and let it out. I didn’t give it milk because I didn’t have any milk. A few weeks ago I watched the cat as it sat on the front lawn. Its owner was painting on the same lawn as the cat sat behind him yawning, scratching and licking itself. I’m not very sure if I should let it in my flat because: My neighbour might hear it meowing and suspect me of taking it. It will shed its fur on the carpet and my wife is allergic to fur. It might expect me to do all kinds of things for it I also encounter the cat in the backyard. Usually it’s lying asleep, or half asleep, in a shady section next to the fence. When it sees me it sometimes comes towards me and rubs itself against my leg, and I sometimes respond by patting it. It will sometimes go to sleep in my shadow after I sit down. Then, when I go to return upstairs, it will usually follow me and wait for some milk. I have a saucer outside my front door and another one outside my back door. The one I originally had at the front door was broken by my other neighbour. Before I knew what had happened (she claims to have accidentally stepped on it in the darkness), it sat there broken for several days and I found myself pondering the possibility of the cat somehow smashing it. The first cat I ever had was a Siamese cat called Piewacket. This was a very sad and moody cat which didn’t like to interact with people. The death of this cat – the scene of its very sudden death – remains glowing in my mind with great drama. I was about six or seven years old at the time and I was standing outside my family’s house with my parents late one night saying goodbye to a departing guest. Piewacket was standing around and then started leaping about in an uncharacteristically happy manner. We all watched with surprise as it had its fun and we reflected on the strangeness of its happiness. Then I watched as it jumped really high and came down on its head and snapped its neck. It died instantly, its dead eyes staring up at me. It was the first death I had ever encountered and I still can’t quite believe that Piewacket is dead. Since then I’ve had several cats and lived in many places where other people’s cats hang around. I would say that I am fond of cats but not quite what some people refer to as a cat person. Sometimes I give my neighbour’s cat milk and one day I painted it, 2006 FREE: The ‘Pain’ in ‘Painting’ On a windy Sunday morning I looked out my bedroom window and saw my neighbours ute. At that moment he emerged onto the footpath carrying some painted canvases which he leant against a small tree. He then went back inside to get several more which he stacked against the first ones. I watched as he gathered perhaps twelve canvases, all different in size and depicting various subjects including a vase of roses, an ocean with some rocks, and a forest. I expected him to load them into his ute as I’d seen him do before; instead, he placed a small cardboard placard inscribed ‘FREE’ in bold red writing, in front of the stack of paintings. He then walked back inside. From my window I wondered “is he giving up painting?” or “is he simply wanting to give people his paintings rather than hold onto them, or try to sell them for hundreds (or thousands) of dollars?” I also noticed the weather beginning to turn, a storm coming maybe, and I briefly envisaged the paintings in the rain. Each of the visible paintings were done in the distinctive thick brushstrokes I had noticed in his other works which had rested or been executed in the front and back lawns over the past months. A small section of a work directly contrasting the others of a wintry landscape in a decorative frame, could be seen poking out towards the back of the stack. The other seven or so works were hidden from view. The stack stood there against the small, windy tree, and I wondered whether this was something to be sad about. An occasional pedestrian appeared, walking the dog or pushing a pram. One dog tried to take a pee on the stack but was whisked away by its owner. The paintings went largely unnoticed, except when a person would look at the sign and momentarily consider the significance of such a thing, before moving on. Maybe this was because it was Sunday morning and people were tired or maybe they were simply confused by such a thing. I stood and watched each passer-by respond to the stack, unable to tear myself away from the window for fear I would miss something. I fetched a stool to sit on as I watched. I tried to get involved with other things needing to be done but within moments I found myself back at the window. Several hours went by with no paintings being taken from the stack. In looking at and thinking about those paintings, in particular the intense red roses, I startled upon the word ‘pain’ in the word ‘painting.’ Later on some kids (perhaps six or seven years of age) were playing near the stack of paintings. They had various toys including a scooter, a ball and some plastic weapons. One minute they were kicking the ball and running after each other, the next minute stopping to have a duel with their swords or a shootout with their guns. For fifteen minutes or so they ran past and around the stack without looking at it. Then one of the boys noticed the stack, then the sign, and yelled to his friend “look, it’s free” before giving the ocean canvas a big kick. He then returned to the game with the ball and seemed to forget all about the free paintings. At seeing that boy kick the canvas I briefly rose from my stool before resettling and pondering the relationship between the word FREE and the canvas being kicked. Another ten or fifteen minutes lapsed with their high energy playing and fighting before the other boy saw the stack after hiding from his friend directly behind it. He then walked to the front of the paintings to have a look and, when seeing the FREE sign, stabbed a canvas with his plastic sword, right in its middle, which was incidentally, the same ocean work kicked by his friend. In doing so I also noticed that he had stepped on the FREE sign (which now appeared face down). The stack was in a state of partial disarray. The kids then returned to fighting one another and were soon called home by a mother. At that point I left the window and went to the kitchen to have some lunch… Pretty soon I was back at the window and there I saw that the stack of paintings had been neatly put back together, this time with a bigger picture of some green trees to the front. The cardboard sign saying FREE was again face up. I wondered who had done this - Was it my neighbour? I then considered many other things such as “Was he watching the stack?” “Had he seen the boy stabbing his painting?” “Was he in the room below me watching the stack through a slit in the curtains?” Except for the delivery of the works early that morning I never saw my neighbour over the course of that day. By mid afternoon there was still no sign of paintings having been taken. The wind was blowing very hard by this stage and over the next few hours the front painting fell forward on two separate occasions. I was at the window for the most part of the day but inevitably got distracted with other things or went to the toilet, but on each occasion I returned to the window to find that the fallen paintings had been restacked. I could no longer see the wounded ocean painting but I thought I could see its left edge sticking out from behind the larger, now foregrounded, forest. I watched the darkening clouds gather and felt certain a storm was about to begin. But it never did, those dark clouds moved by without shedding a single drop of rain. And as the day drew to a close I estimated that at least three works had been taken by the time it got dark. The movement obviously continued overnight because by the following morning there were only three remaining paintings – all, strangely enough, lying face down. The FREE sign, presumably, was lying beneath. Wounded Ocean Last night, while taking out the garbage via the side passage, I heard loud noises from the adjacent house. When I turned to look I could see a boy in his bedroom (painted bright blue), engaged in an imaginary duel with his plastic sword. From the noises he was making I knew immediately that it was the same boy who had stabbed my neighbour’s painting only days before. I wheeled the bin onto the street before returning down the passage for the second bin. On walking back, past the boy’s room, I looked up and saw on his wall my neighbour’s wounded ocean painting. I fetched the second bin which I wheeled out the front and placed beside the first bin. (detail) Epilogue About a week ago my neighbour moved out. He told us he was building a house somewhere in the country on a cheap plot of land he’d found; he seemed happy. As yet nobody else has moved in and it’s kind of quiet all of a sudden – no more sounds of canvases being prepared (and painted on), or front lawn conversations about art. Also, no more cat expectantly following me upstairs. There are still some traces of his occupancy here: a red rubber glove on the laundry floor where his washing machine was, some paint marks on the letterbox, and a pile of wood shavings on the back lawn. And then there’s the paintings, presumably gleaned by other residents from this street; maybe they’re hanging on bedroom walls (like next door) or sitting in garages, or maybe, like my neighbour, they’re hundreds of miles away by now.