This afternoon I received the decision of the Pastel Society in London, about entries for their annual open exhibition. Naturally I’m disappointed that my offering has not been accepted. (Selection is in three stages, and I suppose that there ought to be some consolation in the fact that I made it to stage 2.) At least the receipt of a definite decision has put an end to the dreadful state of nerves I’ve been in for the past week. This made it impossible to do anything very useful, I have been so distracted. I do wonder whether there is some way of developing a kind of calm resignation about events of this kind, but I have no idea how to go about it. What is more, I’m not actually convinced that it would be a good thing. After all, could I really be expected to develop a sense of complete equanimity about the reception of my art? For as long as I want to make sure that my pictures do come before the public I guess that this emotional roller-coaster is going to be considered as normal. Even so, I am sure that there must be ways of managing the process in a less stressful manner.
The best thing that happened today is my regular Italian language conversation class. I had a new, temporary teacher today, and I can’t remember ever having such an amusing session. By pure chance she is an anthropologist by training, earning a bit on the side as a language coach. She has spent some time in Bosnia also, so we had a good deal to talk about. The brain is a funny old thing, however, as once the Balkans surfaced in conversation I found my brain being contaminated repeatedly by Serbo-Croatian*, interfering with the Italian.
*…. or “Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian” as it came to be known in the International War-Crimes Tribunal. All that seems like another life now!