Art

I like it in the way I like jazz: I enjoy it without being able to explain why. I can't tell you anything clever about brushwork, but I know when a picture makes me stop walking. Lacquer paintings do that to me, the old Vietnamese ones with gold leaf and crushed eggshell. Galleries are a more recent habit. A friend dragged me to the Fine Arts Museum in Hanoi last year, and I expected to be bored stiff, but we stayed for three hours. I do find small private galleries a bit intimidating, though; I always feel the staff can tell I'm not going to buy anything. As a child I drew constantly, mainly on things I shouldn't have. There's still a faded crayon chicken on the wall behind my parents' wardrobe. At school, however, art class meant copying a vase the teacher had drawn on the board, so my enthusiasm faded quickly. Should it be compulsory? Yes, at least in the early years, but without marks. The moment you grade a child's drawing out of ten, you teach them that there's a right way to see a flower.