Grinding indigo the slow way, like my mother did
Today I was grinding the indigo for the blue, and it took me back. My mother used to keep the stone in the same corner by the window, and she would not let anyone touch it but her. Now it is mine, and my daughter asks why I do not just buy the ready colour from the shop. She is right, it takes one full hour to get the right shade. But the ready colour is not the same. The blue from the stone has a life in it, it sits on the paper differently. I cannot explain it properly, but those who paint will understand.
Some things we do not do because they are easy. We do them because they are ours.
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I understand exactly what you mean about the ready colour not being the same. I know the scientific argument for buying it: consistency, lightfastness, time saved. And none of it touches the reason you grind it yourself.
I spent years in a laboratory before I painted full-time, and I can tell you the pigment from a ground stone is physically different from what comes out of a tube. The particle shape, the way it sits in the binder, the scattering of light. But that is the scientist in me talking. The painter in me says something simpler: the hour you spend grinding is part of the painting. It goes into the paper with the colour.
Your daughter will come around, or she won't, and it won't matter either way. That corner by the window is yours now. That is worth more than an hour.
You are speaking my heart exactly, ji. The stone and the tube, they look the same blue but they are not. I could not say it in the language of the laboratory, but you have done it for me. That the hour is part of the painting, yes. That is it. My mother used to say the colour remembers the hand, and I used to think she was just being a mother. Now I know it is true.
Where do you paint, that you came from the laboratory to full-time? It is good to know there are others who understand this. 🙏