Description
After two paintings by the painter ALDÉHY
— I am the lover of the Sun, I rise in its splendor, radiate at its zenith and lie down in its peaceful blazes, while your radiance is dark, austere. Like your ether populated by birds of doom, your century agitated by these storms that you call “civilization” … Adorned with the only light of the day, I know myself more amiable than you, vain heavy porcelain d ‘artifices, compassed in heavy attires veiling your skin instead of revealing it.
— The star may be golden on your face but it is far from my throne and only lights up any guests in your wild lands, it has no history, no memory. Your mornings are the same as other mornings, nothing changes under your immutable azure. No one contemplates you, except your own shadow and some furtive strangers whose names will not be remembered by any stele … While princes approach me, illustrious courtiers revere me, painters dream of my curves, sculptors engrave me in eternity.
— Certainly centuries will forget me but the present glorifies me! What do I need to shine in a thousand years? The happiness of the moment is enough for me. I’m happy to be admired as long as I breathe. I don’t care about being beautiful except through anonymous looks
as long as it flatters me and makes those I meet happy!
— You are only an ephemeral silhouette, a dragonfly passing by that will replace other young ladies as light and volatile … I am a marble statue, a unique work, an image frozen forever in the ideal of men of my world made of palaces and castles. My forehead will never be tarnished: it will remain intact for posterity. As admirable as you are, you will only have sand and foam for your tomb.
— Your kingdom is full of gold and refinements, erected by art tops, embellished with fabulous and fertile gardens, but it is also torn apart by absurd storms, ravaged by bloody madness. It is full of fantasies and progress but also of fatal industries. I do not envy your Olympiad and its threatening horizons. Your sky is dazzling with promise but your soil is awful. I am content with the intimate treasure of my destitution, knowing that I am equal to everything created, without other ambition but without any melancholy. The price of your happiness is also that of your unhappiness. Unlike you, I go through life without laurels but without misery. You are prestigious in your empire, but I am happy on my island. You have success, I have the light. You wear diamonds, I have my only smile. We both have beauty, but I have one thing more essential than your splendor: my simplicity.
Raphaël Zacharie de IZARRA