“The fact of storytelling hints at a fundamental human unease, hints at human imperfection. Where there is perfection there is no story to tell.”

 

(Ben Okri, novelist and poet)

When I was a little kid, long before I discovered the arts, I loved creating new worlds when I went to bed.

In the middle of these mental performances, filled with kings and brave warriors (I was always the king, by the way), I decided I had enough of the troubles we, kings and warriors, faced every day.

From that night on, I was going to create a perfect world. Perfect. No troubles, no pain. Just pure serenity and peace of mind. Running a kingdom every night is stressful, you know.

As I realized I had a lot of hard work to do, that same night I abolished lies from my kingdom (Yes, I was the king; apparently, the number of candidates for the throne was quite small at the time).

I can’t remember if it was that night or the next when I also abolished death (I know what you’re thinking, but José Saramago published Death With Interruptions a couple of decades later, so I keep my moral merit for being the first head of state to abolish death).

I kept abolishing stuff for some nights and was really satisfied seeing my beloved subjects freed from pain and anguish.

After a few nights, I started to get bored of my perfect new world. I often switched back to previous worlds that were so excitingly imperfect.

That was the first hint of how imperfection would slowly pervade my life.

A few years later, I was at the movies with some friends when the trailer for an upcoming film caught my attention.

A beautiful girl riding a beautiful dragon was worth my attention!

I couldn’t wait for the movie to hit my local theater (a dragon is a dragon at any stage of my life)!

You can’t imagine my surprise when it turned out the beautiful girl was actually a cute boy!

I was literally fascinated by the boy I thought was a girl (that too was a hint, but that’s another story).

Despite my young age (I think I was 10 or so), I recalled my Perfect World (I still run it now from time to time) and made a mental note:

“Boys that you thought were girls are extremely cute.”

Evidently, in a perfect world, there’s no room for such mistakes. Evidently, perfect worlds are immensely boring.

So, at the age of ten (or so), I came to a conclusion that would pervade my whole life:

Imperfection is something unexpected.

Today, I’m sure that early discovery changed my life and later became the foundation on which I developed my art style.

Believe me, becoming a fan of imperfection frees your life:

• Your mind expands: come on, you can’t be narrow-minded when you focus on the imperfect, unexpected, and unusual side of things.
• You become more independent: nobody can dictate your fashion style or travel plans because you’re not looking for the perfect fit or the perfect trip.
• You make good friends: you would be amazed to discover how interesting people can be who don’t fit the criteria of normality (remember that our society tends to overlap normality and perfection).
• You have unique and exceptional experiences: if you’re open to the unusual, the unusual will find you. Imperfect people aren’t satisfied with mass perfection; we want more, we want uniqueness!
• You plunge into a universe of beauty: an imperfect detail can give life and energy to a face, a body, an artwork, or anything you find on your way. Imperfect people enjoy beauty where others just see…imperfections.
• Your taste for art gets a new, exciting layer: enjoy the infinite power of imperfection and discover art styles that ignore the usual visual horizons and expand your artistic passion beyond consciousness.
• You’ll love imperfections: as I learned with my Perfect World, human beings tend to get bored of perfection. You get used to a beautiful face or a perfectly defined body. Even your lover’s perfections will become invisible (or vanish) at some point. Learning how to become fond of imperfections, to smile at your partner’s obsessions or feel the uniqueness of their weird moments, is a great way to keep the fire alive.

These are just a few hints of how embracing imperfection can change your life, and I could talk and write for hours about the beauty of imperfection (by the way, that’s why I started this blog).

I have the rare privilege of being an artist and living and practicing imperfection in my wonderful job every day.

In September 2023, I was at the opening of my solo show “Whispers in Twilight” at 532 Thomas Jaeckel Gallery in New York City (www.532gallery.com).

I was amazed by the crowd of people who were enjoying my paintings and commenting on the vibrant colors and the energy they felt through their imperfect, weird, irrational strokes.

At some point, two ladies stepped into the gallery, looked around in horror, and just turned back and ran away.

That was a warm moment for me (honestly, I’m used to all kinds of reactions at my shows) because my art is like imperfection: you embrace it or you just shy away from it.

But once again, in a Perfect World where every work of art is appreciated…art would be so boring it would soon disappear.

Now, if you are ready to welcome imperfection into your life, if you want to be less mass and more mess, if you wish to get rid of the stress of perfection, join me on my journey through the wonderful universe of imperfection!