“Churchill knew a lot about painting, and he could write and speak about it and about himself without obviously boasting, a gift to which the readers and audiences of modern politicians may pine. In a 1925 essay entitled “Painting as a Pastime”, Churchill depreciated his ability to paint–never mind that his paintings were competent enough. It is a fact that some famous painters gave him instruction. By the time he was finished, his paintings, including many that had been painted prior to 1925, were exhibited at the Royal Academy of the Arts on no fewer than thirteen occasions, the last a one man exhibition devoted to his works. Yet Churchill wrote that”there is no subject on which I feel more humble” and “at the same time more natural”.\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 “Just to paint is great fun,” one paragraph begins. “The colors are lovely to look at and delicious to squeeze out.” But the paragraph is not about the fun of painting or the deliciousness of sqeezing out the colors; rather Churchill violated his habit of announcing his oaragraphs with clear topic sentences. From the fun of painting , the paragraph proceeds to launch a battle. Churchill wrote that “as one “slowly begins to escape from the difficulties of choosing the right colors…wider considerations come into view.”\u00a0 \u00a0Churchill “slowly” began to escape from the difficulties of painting. Though not obvious, this is a claim to competence. Having begun to escape those difficulties, Churchill could understand painting more fully. For him painting a picture is “like fighting a battle; and trying to paint a picture is, I suppose is like trying to fight a battle.”It is, he wrote “more exciting than fighting it successfully.” Did Churchill mean that?\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0It appears that Churchill had something serious to say in this funny essay, but he did not want the essay to seem serious. Otherwise he might be vaunting his experience fighting and his experience painting., which would not work so well for any of his purposes.\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Churchill fought battles successfully, and he painted many pictures. One wonders whether he was more excited as he painted than he was in the heat of battle. He continued, “But the principle for painting and fighting a battle is the same.” How so? “It is the same kind of problem as unfolding a long, sustained , interlocked argument.” It seems then that painting a picture is not only like fighting a battle but also like making an argument. Moreover “it is a proposition which, whether of few or numberless parts, is commanded by a single unity of conception.” Painting and arguig and fighting have to do with more than details, although details are essential to the problem presented by each. the details have no order without “a single unity of conception.” Painting a great picture requires an “all embracing view which presents the beginning and the end, the whole and each part, as one instantaneous impression retentivly and untiringly held in the mind.”<\/p>\n
Excerpted fom “Churchill’s Trial”. Author, Larry P. Arnn. Publisher: Nelson Books, Nashville, Tennessee,\u00a0 Nelson Books and Thomas Nelson are registered trademarks of HarperCollins Christian Publishing, Inc.<\/p>\n
Come to think of it, might “Vlad the Bad” be a painter? Is he painting a picture for all the world to see?\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0If so, his landscapes certainly rival “Guernica”.. One can only hope that he paints himself into an irrevocable corner.<\/p>\n
Islander.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
“Churchill knew a lot about painting, and he could write and speak about it and about himself without obviously boasting, a gift to which the readers and audiences of modern politicians may pine. In a 1925 essay entitled “Painting as a Pastime”, Churchill depreciated his ability to paint–never mind that his paintings were competent enough. … Continue reading “Churchill”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2580","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewalrussaid.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewalrussaid.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewalrussaid.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewalrussaid.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewalrussaid.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2580"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/thewalrussaid.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2580\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2583,"href":"https:\/\/thewalrussaid.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2580\/revisions\/2583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewalrussaid.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}