Allchorn Design

I had lunch with the exceptionally talented artist Christian Mugnai at Spiga d’Oro today and we had a rather interesting and amusing discussion about things. Chris and I have been mates since we first taught each other swear words when he moved here from Italy… in std 2 (approx. 5yrs old). In amongst all the jibber jabber and catching up we drew some parallels in our work, and trials and tribulations we face daily.

One of them was the inevitable discussion of the value of one’s work. I had the perfect story to let Chris understand how I feel about evaluating one’s work. Here it is, and if you’ve heard it before and I got details wrong, or know the original storyteller, please comment and let me know before crying foul. I will credit the originator once I know.

Pablo Picasso was walking through a park one day and he came across a woman who recognised him immediately. “You’re Pablo Picasso aren’t you?” she stated, and he replied that he was. “You’re my favourite artist!” she exclaimed. “Won’t you sketch my portrait?”.

Pablo agreed to do so and whipped out his sketch pad and pencil. He looked at her with intense concentration, tilted his head to the left, then the right, closed his eyes and thought for a second, opened them and laid 3 lines on the paper with great dexterity.

He passed the paper to the woman who looked at it for a moment, and she cried out “Absolutely incredible! In these 3 lines you have captured exactly who I am! I must pay you for this sketch Mr Picasso, what do I owe you for this?”.

Pablo thought for a second and said it would be £5,000 for the sketch. “What!?” she blurted. “It literally took you 20 seconds and 3 strokes of your pencil?!”.

“No my dear” he calmly replied, “it took me my entire life.”

And that’s the story. If you don’t understand the moral, or what it’s about, just comment and I’ll gladly explain. It’ll actually be interesting to see if anybody “doesn’t” understand.