My painting

I must write what I feel. Words are the eyes I see the world with. They are every crumb of bread I put to my lips. It is one way my soul speaks to the earth and its creatures. Therefore, I employ language to translate the sensations which are the very essence of my being. Lately, I have been exploring a different medium of art. I've been painting. I started because I felt obliged. I continued because it opened my eyes to something new. My painting is a visual representation of how it feels when one steps from the darkness of ignorance to the light of seeing things for how they truly are. Plato did a remarkable job of illustrating this with his timeless allegory of the cave. My intention is to show this change through the painting of a rooster. This particular rooster lives on a cruel farm with many other chickens. He is resigned to his fate, but dreams of something better. Until one day,he learns he is about to be killed, and then, decides to explore his possibilities. Out of growing consternation, he ventures around the farm and discovers a hole in the fence. In a indecisive moment, he hesitates, but realizing he has nothing to lose, plunges boldly forward. As depicted in my painting, he runs joyously down a hill, flinging out his wing with the sheer bliss of newly discovered freedom. He has never felt so alive!
I choose a rooster because I have owned chickens throughout my childhood and they will always be close to my heart. When I look at this rooster I think how much it is like me. I too, was unknowing and content with my ignorance until the day I became more afraid of the darkness of close-mindedness. I chose to step out of the proverbial cave into the dazzling light of the sun. I was amazed at to discover the beauty around me that I couldn't see with my eyes closed. My painting has also opened my eyes. As I gaze as this rooster that miraculously appeared of my canvas I seek answers to how it will react. Will it go back to the farm to show others the hole in the fence? Will they listen and follow him to freedom? Or as Plato suggest, will they chose to mock him and his new reality, comfortable in accepting life as they think it has to be. To me to question is to live. You can only exist if you don't question, then seek answers.