There’s some great auctions up by now featuring the duel turtle artist Georgie and Nikki. Yeah, those are the actual artist’s–a couple of turtles walking on a canvas. Auction 1: Spring, auction 2: Dreamscape, auction 3: Blue Dragon, auction 4: Sunset Clouds.
So I emailed the seller the following:
Hi. I really enjoyed your auction for the turtle paintings. i like how the turtle is actually investigating the painting as he’s making it. It leads you to believe that the turtle is actually considering the marks that he’s making on the canvas. Oh, excuse me, I just read the auction the turtle is a “she” and i see that she told you what colors to use. nice. wait. wait. the turtle is now speaking to me. the turtle is saying… the turtle is saying, “I want a round canvas next time. Give me a ROUND canvas.”
and another email:
Hey, it’s me again. Again, loving the other turtle auction paintings. You say that there are a bunch of photos documenting this. Does the buyer get to have those photos? It’s not very clear. It’s the photos that really make this piece. It’d be a great idea if you had a nice framed photo collage that would hang nicely alongside the painting. Then people would love to hang both next to each other. oh yeah! what a great idea!
Part of the brilliancy behind these paintings is the fact that the “animal communicator” (the human) used turtles for this. Turtles are nice and slow and thoughtful. We would dismiss something more crazy like a dog. Unless if it was a really slow thoughtful dog, like those hotdogs. Even then. The canvas would have to be a lot bigger. With the turtles, the paintings can be kept small for better ebay shipping.
I really enjoyed this line: “A portion of proceeds will be donated to organizations that rescue and help turtles & tortoises.”
Plus the rest of the description is brilliant:
“During an animal communication with Georgie he told me the colors he wanted to paint with that day.”
“He titled the work ‘Dreamscape’ after completion.”
Now I just need a pet to make paintings for me. I was going to get a fish aquarium to sit next to my computer at home. But fish can’t really make paintings. Or can they?…
Turtles indeed do see color http://www.austinlostpets.com/articles/prevglad.htm#Q8 And!.. Birds, turtles and butterflies have four or five different types of photoreceptors. This may allow these animals to see ultraviolet or infrared light. http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/news411.html (humans only have three types of photoreceptors)
I have a Xanga buddy who I believe would love this post. I’m going to send him the link …
the turtle is painting the painting, or the human being is painting the painting? is the turtle talking to the human, telling him what to paint? or is the turtle painting? are the turtles talking to each other? there are three turtles?
okay, i get it. the turtle tells the human what colors to use. the human paints the background, then puts some other paint globs on the canvas. then the turtles swim around on top of the paint, creating the patterns. a cool idea. hope the paint is nontoxic to turtles! otherwise they might die young, and become posthumously famous.
spud, maybe you should get some salamanders. they would make awesome paintings!
if the turtles die early, then the paintings would be worth more! (a sad thought though)
yes, but nothing is good about dead turtles. even famous ones. i think they’d rather be incognito and alive than be famously dead.
I got a resonse from the seller of these auctions. Response from email #1: Thank you for your interest in the turtle paintings. Response from email #2: Yes, the pictures do go to the buyer. I hadn’t thought about framing them, but thanks for the idea. Something to think about. I’ll email the seller about the turtles seeing in color now.