The Bridge

Moje’kJoe Papapaah felt like deserting the bridge for a while: It would be a while before the Jotmaster and the apprentice return from their expedition of the current textual chain. Moments earlier when he checked the monitor all was well with them within the tex-Ah-verse. And outside of the cockpit he observed that the alpha numerical belts were stable as the hover craft cruised smoothly. It could be an hour or so before they crack the current code. At any rate the Jotmaster preferred to move cautiously in these matters, preferring to savour every detail of the pseudo reality erected by the alphanumerical belts. While the two were gone this could be the opportunity to indulge in his own fancies, a trip involving art. He looked at his smart chronograph strapped on his left wrist.  With a long press at the centre of the digital dial the rectangular screen was pervaded by a vibgyor spectrum after it disperse the arms. He mimicked the number 1-9-4-0-, and an  inflection ’ chasing – S.

Although he could not decide on the specific date he consoled himself that this was an opportunity to trial test the programme as long as the decade was specified. He crossed the bridge to his work station. Suddenly as if seized by a strange urge to hurry up following a sequence of keying several instructions into Tra; his own concocted computer programme, He only had a five minute window to take the lift to level B of the hover craft lest the calibrations which he had just inserted into the subframe of Theta’s CPU via Tra expired or worse seep to wherever pseudo reality that the Jotmaster and the Apprentice were indulging in presently. Theta warned. The two have never shown an interest in his turf, he thought as he entered the hyper lift next to the textportation paddock, his cape settling from the hurried movement he made as he entered the lift. In an instant just as the slide doors swoosh closed they swoosh open for he had reached the level below. Save for the light flooding from the hyper Lift the area was dark with a long backless padded bench in the middle. As the light from the hyper lift gently died, taking with itself the mannerist shadow figure it cast of Moje’kJoe Papapaah form on the floor, he sat himself down and was gently bathed in darkness. A few seconds later his wrist watch started to glow and as it tightened on his wrist he was forced to open his hand as the effect almost stopped the blood flowing to his hand and the wrist gadget through his palm projected a flash of the vibgyor spectrum before him. And as his hand jerked with the impact of the emission, he instantly stood. He hoped that all would go well as a blob of colours materialised and swirled before him and instantly approached him while he felt his lanky form lift from the floor. Then as if he was been overtaken by a curious breeze the blob was gently pushed backwards and became a painted scene observed through a rectangular window.

 

GS

His eyes took the scene in. He saw a woman walking into the picture plane from the left with a flat huge bowl balanced on her head. She was about to cross paths with a Reverend in dressed in black complete with a hat from whose right hand a walking cane issued. Just behind them two men, while on a stroll were talking. One of them who was wearing a white shirt seem animated as his right hand stretched out to emphasise what he was saying to his companion. Just behind the pair was a man who seemed like a labourer entering the scene from the top right pushing a wheelbarrow. Moje’KJoe noted that should one draw a line between the woman entering the scene from the bottom left of the viewer, the one with a flat container on her head, and the Reverend; they will experience a perfect straight line. However when that line is extended to the two men taking a stroll the line will extend from the Reverend diagonally even if its straightness can be maintained until it reached the man pushing the wheel barrow. The man pushing the wheel barrow cannot take this line further since the wall behind him delimits the line’s extension in this direction. The line dies here or rather it acutely changes direction here. Besides the direction of the wheelbarrow and the man move the eyes back into the picture plane.

Our protagonist saw countless of rooftops of houses dotted with trees stretching out into the horizon. He also noted that the direction in which the wheelbarrow pusher or the labourer if one chose to call him such brought back the viewing of this artwork back into the picture plane. And since the viewer, depending on whether he started with the objects in the foreground would have seen the woman with a flat container, the Reverend and the two strollers due to the acknowledgement of linear perspective, they can move towards the left from the man pushing the wheelbarrow and that would lead them towards the veranda of the house facing the viewers position. Here Moje’KJoe saw a woman walking into the house also carrying a flat container. As she moved through the doorway of the house a man wearing a yellow top leaned against one of the pillars. A bowlegged child tottering just in front of her mother carrying what looked like a huge bucket concluded the distribution of people in the composition. The reddish bottom part of the dress of woman by the doorway echoed the reds that colluded with the yellows and the oranges to express the ground unto which all moved (people) and rested (houses). For the there were no tarmac whereupon cars could move.

On the other hand there was no sign of traffic. The warm coloured earth spilled across the mid-ground towards the top left of the picture plane where the mother and the bowlegged child emerged through an array of close built houses that led them to the pillared house. So through colour the artwork summon the viewer back to the hype of activity of dynamism expressed through straight lines and diagonal lines that proposed relationships that each body had with the other bodies within the composition noted Moje’KJoe. For the wheelbarrow pusher or labourer depending which one you of the two you chose to call him, one could draw a diagonal line that connected to the woman in the doorway. From her a straight line that extended to the man in the veranda and from him another straight line that extended to the bowlegged baby which will pass through him and reached his mother, if we chose to perceive him as a boy. Lastly, here the two women immediately identified as carrying stuff on their heads will link with a vertical line concluding the viewer’s enterprise.

The interplay of colour if it is regarded at all, noted our protagonist, will direct the viewer that should they choose the purple bluish colour that expressed the shadows of the Reverend, they will note the shadow casted by the form of the woman he is about to cross path with. The palette expression is carried over in the shadows expressed in our two strollers, it spills from the veranda of the facing the viewer in the mid ground as it meets diagonally with the wheel barrow pusher and in a mute gesture on the form of the bowlegged little one walking besides his mother. Whereupon Moje’KJoe has acknowledged the movement from the Reverend to the two strollers as diagonal, failing back then to specify the direction as bottom left to top right. The casted shadows were from top left to bottom right. Interplay of shadows and lines cancelled each other and created tension that was not stagnant, but rich in movement as the eye starts with the woman walking into the picture plane at the bottom right, cycle to the right and then ended at the woman with the bow legged child entering the scene from the top left.  He closed his eyes gently as the picture plane morphed into an oval bowl of primary colours and enveloped him, absorbed him and then flattened again on the wall of the darkened room.  The work had consumed Moj’KJoe, leaving the room empty and dark save the humming composition flat on the wall

Coming [{(<*>)}] to

He looked at his shoes and saw them covered with a film of reddish-yellowish soil. As a myriad of biygyor ray expressing his form within the painting receded into the ground. He stood in a passageway of what looked like a crammed street due to the close knit built houses. Nobody seemed to pay attention to him as he ascertained that it could have been late in the afternoon as the shadows were contorted into straight diagonal lines. A dog barked somewhere and muffled by the late cry of a cackling hen. Dressed in a three piece suite that felt heavy and rather hot he spanned on his heels to look up the street and saw a woman carrying a bucket of water with a little girl walking besides her at the other end of the street. The little one was bowlegged. He briskly followed the two. The ground gave a sandy mashy sound as his purposeful steps found their footing. By now he had resolved to see just what Tra was up to through this virtual rendering of the scene he had just studied. He caught up with the woman the child who seemed to have made no progress in their path up the street. And as he passed the woman and child he came into a cul-de-sac. On his left a man stood under the veranda of a grocery store while a woman stepped out. a squeaky-squeakysqueaky- squeakysqueakysqueaky sound from a man approaching with a wheel barrow irritated the ears and deafened one to what two men walking at the centre of the cul-de-sac were saying to each other as a man of cloth was about to cross path with a young woman carrying scones draped with a lace cloth. Moje’KJoe saw just beyond everything on the other curve of the cul-de-sac a man in a well brimmed hat, easel in front of him busy moving his brush swiftly kept stealing glances of the scene. This ought to be the artist! He thought to himself. He ran in a semicircle away from the scene to approach the man on his left so as not to disturb the composition. The house from which the man was painting from was quite when he reached it. He seemed to be living here alone. Gerard, Gerard came a sensual voice from the inside, tea is ready. Moje’KJoe saw the man wipe his hands on a soiled cloth smudged with different colours paint, throwing it into a pool of colours on a pallet carelessly cast away on the bench next to the easel and walked into the house. He did not notice Moj’KJoe who hid opposite him. With one bounce Moj’KJoe jumped the small wall partition or the veranda and stepped into the plain air studio and saw the scene before him frozen in time on canvas. In an instance Tra spewed him out of the picture plane into the darkened room in an instant. As he gently regained gravity the scene before him darkened as the vibgyor beam died and he in turn regained graviy. He took the hyper lift back to the bridge. Perplexed.

 

Autumn

1 April

© Mmutle Arthur Kgokong 2013