“Moreover, it’s easier for gouache to advance to oil painting. After going to college, it’s easier to transform into commercial value by directly painting oil paintings.”
“Is this why you’re transitioning from watercolor to oil painting?” Hua Jie smiled lightly, recalling her choices and life from her previous life, and sighed:
“Not everyone who pursues commercial value can attain it.”
“It’s also possible to put in all the effort, give up all hobbies, and focus solely on seeking wealth, yet still not achieve it.”
“In the end, having dreams and wealth both slip away would be even more tragic.”
With that, she smiled at Shen Jiaru:
“You must be very talented, so talented that you can paint whatever you want and actually succeed in seeking wealth.”
“But I can’t. Since I can’t seek wealth, I can only pursue my own interests. Being able to enjoy the happiness of painting watercolors in the moment is already a good harvest.”
The girl’s eyes were clear, like stepping into the waves, gently swaying with a new and subtle trend.
Shen Jiaru saw the world-weariness in her eyes being engulfed by a gentle smile, marveling at the sophisticated demeanor that didn’t match her age.
Recalling his words just now felt like saying ‘Why not eat meat’.
He chuckled self-deprecatingly.
Surprisingly, he felt a rare sense of relaxation akin to a deep conversation while talking to the girl.
“It’s not easy to understand what you’re doing, what you’re pursuing. I hope you have a smooth journey and maintain this kind of joy until the end,” his voice involuntarily softened.
Hua Jie turned to look at him, staring at his features for a few seconds, and then confirmed her guess.
A great painter, very wealthy, painting oil paintings now, incredibly good-looking, and somewhat resembling Shen Mo…
Blinking her eyes, she didn’t directly ask about his identity. Instead, she pulled out a piece of watercolor paper from her sketchbook and, following her memory, began to replicate an unfinished painting hanging high in Shen Mo’s father’s studio.
Seeing her suddenly start silently painting a new piece, seemingly no longer interested in chatting, Shen Jiaru stood up, thinking that after she finished painting, he would take her out for some fast food like KFC to chat.
He was tired of the previous strategy of trying to get her to willingly ask him to be her mentor. Well, let’s just talk directly.
But just as he took a step back, he stopped in his tracks, frowning and looking down at her painting without moving.
The girl’s brush wasn’t dipped in water but borrowed acrylic paint from a nearby classmate, applying it thickly. The strokes outlined a landscape painting of the northern mountains.
This scene couldn’t be more familiar to Shen Jiaru; it was half-finished, an artwork he had been unable to progress with.
This piece of work also marked the beginning of his stagnation.
As he painted, he suddenly grew tired of the colors he had always used and felt that the previous expressions were dull and stale. So he couldn’t continue painting.
He felt frustrated and angry, struggling to find new inspiration, but that painting remained there, unable to find the right emotions to fill it.
The exposed blank spaces seemed to be stabbing his head.
She visited his studio once, copied a painting there, and the next day she could even reproduce the painting on the wall from memory. Did she stand in front of the painting and observe it carefully?
Why was she so interested in that painting?
Suddenly, Shen Jiaru felt a touch in his heart, as if some deep-seated secret within him had been discovered, making him feel somewhat anxious and uneasy.
As he watched the details on the paper multiply, he couldn’t help but marvel at the girl’s powers of observation and memory of the painting.
Every color and line, she reproduced them almost flawlessly.
Unconsciously, Shen Jiaru sat back down again, his gaze fixed on Hua Jie’s painting, unwavering.
Finally, she finished copying his painting almost perfectly, even including the blank spaces he had left unfilled.
The students around vaguely felt an unusual atmosphere, somewhat solemn, yet with sparks of impending eruption.
Zhang Xiangyang and Zhao Xiaolei also walked up behind Hua Jie and Shen Jiaru, standing like two statues, bowing their heads to inspect.
“Ah…” Zhao Xiaolei couldn’t help but whisper.
How is it this painting?!
As she reached this point in her painting, Hua Jie withdrew her hand, turning to look at Shen Jiaru.
“Teacher, your painting style has always been dreamlike, leaning towards impressionism. Regarding your color matching habits, I hastily summarized it as advanced gray. I hope you don’t mind,” she said.
Obviously, she already knew he was Shen Mo’s father and the owner of the studio she visited yesterday.
“Hmm,” he glanced at her, not expressing much.
He simply waited quietly for what she would say next.
The reason she brought out the painting from his studio to show him must have her intention.
What exactly does she want to do?
“But when you reach a certain age, you begin to feel dissatisfied with pursuing sophistication, chasing after the most popular painting styles of the times, and you also feel tired of the mastery you have long possessed. Your pursuit of art has entered a new stage, and you’re gearing up to break through everything in the past, still making choices.”
Based on her understanding of domestic and foreign art history, combined with Shen Jiaru’s situation, Hua Jie tried to analyze while looking at this painting.
Shen Jiaru’s pupils slightly contracted, looking at Hua Jie in disbelief.
It’s hard not to be surprised to hear these words from a 15-year-old girl.
He stared at her in amazement. Even his colleagues in the circle of painters dared not judge for sure these thoughts he had.
Has this child matured too early and become too insightful, a genius? Or is she just too bold?
Are teenagers nowadays all like this?
Standing behind Shen Jiaru, Zhao Xiaolei also looked at Hua Jie’s face in disbelief, as if to confirm whether the person sitting here was really a child or an experienced old scholar.
This… is too unbelievable.
“I saw this painting yesterday and couldn’t help but feel a bit itchy.” Hua Jie smiled apologetically, then looked at Shen Jiaru with anxious, watery eyes:
“Do you know the Zhenlong chess game broken by Xuzhu in ‘The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber’?”
“I… suddenly had a bit of adolescent syndrome and wanted to tackle this puzzle with you. Please don’t scold me for being reckless and don’t feel like I’m ruining your painting… okay?”
“What?” Shen Jiaru was still a bit slow to react.
“In that case, I’ll start painting.” She shook the pen in her hand slightly, indicating that she was going to continue painting.
Shen Jiaru raised his eyebrows, looked at the painting, then back at the girl, finally realizing what she was setting up.
This little girl actually wanted to continue his painting???
…
…
In the painting on the wall of No. 1 High School campus, all the color combinations had reduced purity, making the color matching look less abrupt and more sophisticated.
But in Shen Jiaru’s painting, the color scheme suddenly changed drastically.
She not only daringly chose multiple pure colors but also vigorously clashed the strokes, making the originally serene landscape painting become restless.
It was as if a person living in the deep mountains, longing for the hustle and bustle of the city, wanting to leave the mountains and enter the world but unable to do so, expressed frustration and anger in the painting.
Shen Jiaru’s emotions suddenly became excited. The painting, which had originally seemed dead and silent to him, now made his blood boil.
He had tried countless painting styles, even gone to see oil painting exhibitions abroad, hoping to find some inspiration from the paintings of major artists from various schools.
But after countless attempts, he always felt inadequate.
After all, no matter how much he tried to innovate, he was still himself, and the habits accumulated over the years were difficult to change. He himself was not really willing to cover up the advantages that had helped him succeed in the past.
Perhaps he had considered using bright colors for painting, but for him, it was indeed a difficult step to take.
To cast away one’s past self and become a completely new self, how could it be so easy?
Only a girl like Hua Jie, as pure as a blank sheet of paper, dares to freely collide and clash in his serene landscape paintings, leaving behind so many neon lights.
…
Outside the window, dark clouds suddenly swept across the sky, obscuring the sun and casting the whole world into darkness.
The wind stirred the clouds.
Then suddenly, a dark patch was pushed aside, and sunlight streamed through the seams, casting a golden glow on the earth, as if everything had been embellished with gold.
People looked up at the brilliant gold amidst the dark and heavy clouds and felt joy;
But if they saw only the endless compression of dark clouds beyond the golden light, they would feel oppressed and stifled.
The same sky evoked various feelings in different people.
Facing Hua Jie’s painting, Shen Jiaru also felt complex emotions.
At times, he felt that the bright colors she laid down disrupted the tranquility, shouting and churning, causing turmoil in the heart.
But then he felt as if his own tranquil landscape painting was tightening from all sides, dissolving the emotions about to burst, as if a hand was soothing the restlessness and indignation in his heart, making him calm.
Hua Jie’s strokes were far inferior to his, and her technique in layering colors was somewhat stiff.
But her mastery of color truly amazed him.
Shen Jiaru, who had been sitting quietly watching her paint, didn’t know when he had stood up, pushing Zhang Xiangyang behind him, bending down to focus on her brush, oblivious to the stiffness in his waist.
It wasn’t until Hua Jie stopped and took a deep breath, placing the brush in the pen holder beside her, that everyone realized they had been watching her paint all along.
The girl raised her head, rubbed her eyes, and then turned to look behind her.
After smiling at Zhao Xiaolei, she looked at Shen Jiaru on the other side and said, “Mr. Shen… I didn’t do very well in my painting, did I offend you?”
Shen Jiaru just glanced at her smile and reached out to grab the drawing board in front of her.
Staring at it for a while, he suddenly sighed deeply.
The bottleneck that he had always felt unable to break through turned out to be his inability to let go of all his past achievements and gains.
No pain, no gain!
“No pain, no gain!”
“Painting is supposed to be about enjoying the freedom and joy of letting your imagination run wild on paper, and you seem to understand this joy very well,” he said, looking up at the girl who was looking at him somewhat nervously.
“I didn’t feel offended at all. You did a great job.”
Upon hearing this, the girl finally relaxed her tense shoulders, and a smile instantly appeared on her face.
There was a hint of moisture in her watery eyes, as if his approval had brought her infinite joy and satisfaction.
The smile of young people is always so pure and simple, without bitterness or complexity.
Shen Jiaru looked at her, unable to suppress his admiration, which overflowed from his eyes.
He didn’t know that the reason why Hua Jie could smile like this was not because she was ignorant of the world’s hardships, but because she had completely let go of her past self after experiencing death and rebirth, and had embarked on a completely new life.
It’s about purity, it’s about thoroughness.
Whether it’s chasing dreams or being a person.
“Do you want to learn watercolor?” Shen Jiaru pushed aside the many emotions filling his heart, held Hua Jie’s painting, and turned to look at her, asking seriously.
“Yes.”
“Even though the international market for watercolors is far inferior to oil paintings?” he asked again.
“A master can shine in any field. I want to learn watercolor.” The girl looked up at him, her eyes particularly determined.
“I originally studied watercolor. During college, I held exhibitions of watercolor paintings and was once praised by the university president as the top landscape watercolor painter in the country. My own watercolor paintings were also rated as national first-grade art masters.”
“Later, I switched to oil painting and made some achievements in the international art scene.”
“I dare not say that my watercolor paintings surpass my oil paintings, but among those painting watercolors in the country today, I can still rank in the top three.”
“Are you willing to learn painting with me?”
Shen Jiaru’s voice was calm and steady, with the confident composure of a successful person.
He looked at her intently, sincere and calm, without a hint of arrogance or seniority.
This was also the first time, not someone begging him to be their teacher, but him taking the initiative to offer guidance to a student.