A Touch of Colour

Walasse Ting’s paintings always fill me with happiness. The vibrant colours and joyful images, what’s not to like? If I had just one touch of his colour, I would be happy.

I longed to make his acquaintance and one day when he held his exhibition in Hong Kong, Jimmy Lai the newspaper tycoon introduced us to each other. Walasse was tall and heavily built. Although he was in his sixties, he looked younger. He was surprised by my knowledge of his work and said he liked reading my articles and that we could become friends. I refused. I begged to become his student.

“I could never teach you how to paint,” he said, “because I was never taught painting myself.”

“Really?” I asked.

“Look at my work. All the lines are like a child’s scrawl. It’s the colours that captivate people.”

“Then teach me how to use colour.”

“Is it your ambition to become a famous painter? Because if it is, you’re too late. It takes a whole lifetime just to have the chance to become an ordinary artist, let alone a good one. At your age you can only capture a glimpse.”

“That’s all I ask.”

“Ok, then we can become friends.”

“Friends then,” I said finally.

From then on, I took every chance to meet up with him when he travelled to China or other parts of the Far East.

Once in Shanghai we went to a famous restaurant. Walasse ordered nearly every dish on the menu. “It’s not every day that I can get good Chinese food in Amsterdam,” he said.

The waiter came over and saw the whole table of food, “Only the two of you? Who did you invite that didn’t show up?”

“Oh” Walasse said, “we invited Li Po, Picasso, Einstein and many others.”

I made a point of going to Amsterdam where Walasse lived, whenever I could. I arrived early in the morning.

Jesse, Walasse’s son met me in the airport. Since then I have become a friend of the family too. Walasse had a son and a daughter Mia who lived in New York.

I booked the same room in the Hilton where Lennon and Yoko took those famous photos.

Walasse’s house used to be an old secondary school. The wooden door was quite small, and he painted it with wildflowers. Jesse said the door had been stolen twice. When I entered, I found the largest studio any artist could ever dream of. It was a converted indoor basketball hall. The ceiling was three storeys high and lined with five hundred tubes of fluorescent lights so that Walasse could turn any gloomy weather into a summer holiday.

A strong scent of onions hit you. It was from hundreds of bulbs of Amaryllis. They seemed to be blooming all at the same time.

“Let’s drink!” Walasse took out the vintage Cristal.

“Are we supposed to drink champagne in the morning?” I asked.

“Are we supposed to drink champagne at night?” he replied.

After finishing the first bottle he opened the second one.

“So,” I said, “how do I begin to use brilliant colours like you do?”

“Don’t learn from me. Learn from nature. Anything that is colourful is your teacher. Look at the kingfisher that just flew into the garden. Look closely. Can you see the colours of its feathers? Remember it, study it, recreate it.”

“What material should I use?”

“I find acrylic is brighter. The best is a French product called Flashe. You can dissolve it like water colour or use it just like in oil painting.”

He drew a woman’s figure in black and white and said, “Go ahead, paint it in colour.”

Recalling his many paintings, I splashed patches of colour onto it. He nodded. Bottles of champagne were consumed. Then the lessons went on and on until midnight. At that stage I was so drunk that I collapsed onto his couch and fell asleep.

The next day we went to the Albert Cuyp Market and bought tons of food. The most enjoyable one was the raw herring which we ate like the locals, head back and chew it. We returned to the studio to cook and paint and drink. They were the most memorable moments of my life.

“What material should I paint on?” I asked.

“Any,” he answered, “paper, cloth, refrigerators. Anything that is monotonous and dull. Colour them. Bring them to life. Bring joy to them and yourself.”

Which I did. I even painted my suitcases. When I passed through customs people would recognise them. “Walasse Ting?” they asked with a smile.

Later I bought a thousand white neckties and painted them too. I don’t mind if people called me a copycat. If I could inherit a touch of colour from Walasse Ting, it would make me happy for the rest of my life.