Cy Gavin

So it concentrated my attention on what I could and it fostered an imagination that was maybe a sort of...

like a escape hatch um but when i say there's a difference between skill and talent in my case is that it was very easy to um for people in my family maybe and other people too to say you're talented because you have drawn this thing that looks like that thing

from observation or by copying it.

But that one sort of removed them from that equation.

It meant that you were special, you could do this and we can't.

And I remember very distinctly being a young person and all of my friends drew and they all drew all the time and they drew well.

And then at some point people told them that they were good at writing or that they were good at wrestling or whatever.

And then they became people who looked at me and said that you're talented.

So for me, it felt like an inadequate explanation for something.

But I also think like whenever I would draw, I really remember and what was gratifying about it was that it was, as I said, like a thing that...

Um, the muscles of your hands are used for writing as well.

So it was something that I could say, say like this week I could do something that I couldn't do literally two weeks ago.

Yeah.

Compared to say, like trying to learn an instrument, which I tried to do as well.

So by comparison, it was much more like immediate gratification to be able to, to create something that would be a gift for someone.

And also that would distinguish me in a way that would give me attention and make people feel that I had value in a society that otherwise probably didn't see that value.

For sure.

Not in these things so much.

I mean, these are paintings that I made when I was in high school.

And the first oil painting I made is this weird self-portrait with a bird on the shoulder.