I became completely self-absorbed during my walk and I told myself I’d never seen flora more autistic than these extremely tall palm trees, a probable consequence of their radical excess. Their autism appeared to be a sign of or condition for happiness, and as I walked about here and there and interrupted my thoughts to look up and see them standing erect like that in the most unexpected places, I felt a powerful sensation of envy, which led me to register with them a mental protest at the injustice of the situation: they were happy, indifferent to all that was earthly; and I was tormented by my doubts and worries, or quite simply condemned to scarcely take my eyes off the ground.

Very seldom had plants, generally speaking, induced feelings of empathy in me beyond the friendship you might feel as you pour water into your favorite flowerpot, for instance, or when you believe a modest spritz or some care will help the sick geranium. I also remembered the science experiments in school, especially the white beans or similar legumes set out to germinate, for which I used a glass jar and blotting paper soaked in water. And I told myself, on reliving it all, that my first and practically only experience of compenetration with the plant world dated back to that time; I don’t know what to call it, a state of intense identification, perhaps even mystical, though always wrapped in domestic ceremonies, like watering or the eventual pruning, and tangible effects, like the changing of leaves, growth or attenuation. Every result of that past activity had obviously disappeared, for who knows where the old sprout can possibly be today, or the leaves fallen years ago. My habitual indifference to plants thus gave my unforeseen solidarity with the palm trees an added coloration, much more specific because of its contrast to my former disregard, even if from all standpoints unverifiable since I clearly couldn’t take credit for the existence of those tall, healthy palm trees, of a perfect verticality and an enviable self-sufficiency, that was obvious.

In one open space in the park, astonishingly devoid of meaning because it was devoted to nothing in particular, I’d been able to come up to an exceedingly tall palm tree, maybe the oldest or the healthiest, at the base of which you got dizzy if you looked up. The ground in that spot was completely flat, and the tree thus formed a perfect perpendicular if you disregarded the logical thickening of the trunk before its base and above the ground. Consequently, the right angle could be verified from a distance, and up close would be refuted. I looked at the smooth trunk, to all appearances endless, so that it was hard to determine at which point it resolved into the fronds of the crown, which were long and curved downward under their own weight; I saw the trunk rising to that incredible point, at a distance that was possibly infinite, and told myself that perhaps the fronds were an expression of fear, or in any event, an improvised solution, because the tree itself considered it impossible to go on rising. Impossible, and perhaps useless too. At that moment, as I looked upward, overcome by vertigo, an idea occurred to me that even I found crazy: I longed to imagine the point from which a camera could take a picture of me at the foot of that tree, including the full height of the trunk beside me. I told myself it was probably impractical, since the camera would have to penetrate the deep underwood of the park and obstacles would intervene. If that image were possible, I’d look like a diminutive being, at the mercy of the whims of an outsized giant. What type of document would that photo be, I wondered. A moment from the naturalistic expedition, where the contrast with the majestic is a frequent and even obligatory step. I realized, then, that taking that photo was impossible, and still more, was inconceivable as fantasy, because the image created in my head proved more appropriate to tropical savannas, where the void finds its corroborating argument in those isolated, prominent trees. And in all likelihood that palm tree was nothing but that argument, the clearing’s justification, that is, an allusion to much of the territory.

I remembered all this sitting at my table on the terrace, as the reflection on the lake gradually darkened. I’ve been a casual viewer of Kentridge’s animated films. When I tried to get hold of one to watch at my leisure, it proved impossible. One time I managed to find a CD-ROM, but it was very costly and seems a joke, because it’s got barely forty to fifty seconds of just a few of his works. Since it was old, I needed programs that no longer exist in order to run it. When I inserted it my computer began making a brand-new noise, like a vacuum cleaner’s, that could be heard all over the house. Only after a great deal of effort and patience was I finally able to watch the disc, with the results just mentioned. In any case, though I consider myself a casual viewer of his work, and thus a mere admirer, I suspect that the recourse of the visible gaze was the initial find that allowed him to develop a good part of the rest.

I won’t expand on this too much. My hypothesis is that at a subsequent moment the artist noticed that in the dramatic world of his drawings, it was unnecessary for objects or individuals to have eyes in order to establish mutual relationships. In the end, a dotted line was able to render a relationship that was as invisible as any gaze. This has made the drawings seem subject to a process of nonstop self-generation, it’s something otherwise self-evident. It seems a world created out of geometry, and thus tending towards, or involuntarily, metaphysical. But this has also permitted a second success, I don’t hesitate to call it that, which consists in highlighting the materiality of his work, its deep and genuine artifice, because the dotted lines exhibit the intensive construction that shapes them and organizes the work. It’s a work that displays itself being made, insofar as the procedure — the lines and dots in constant transformation — is comprised in the sequential development of the stories.

From the time of this discovery, my Felix of Kentridge (put that way, he sounds like a distinguished personage or a nobleman) became my secret coat of arms. I ought to say “my Felixes,” since they take on differing personalities and are moved by different motives. For quite some time, in my private language — the unspoken one that belongs to me exclusively and which I use only in my constant mental soliloquies — to feel “like a Kentridge character” is my way of expressing the worst possible condition, the level beneath which one is unable to live. Feeling that way means being squashed to the ground, pulverized as a result of an act of vengeance of matter itself and undone until the next, but still uncertain, resurrection. Because apart from that, these characters have no moral alibi, they’re not able to escape the blame or responsibility the story itself places on them. They can only express a diffuse suffering, between physical and spiritual, although they don’t always do so, just like me. True suffering is a borrowed emotion, assigned by a viewer on seeing Felix’s face in close-up as he looks at himself in the mirror, for instance, or when thanks to the transformation of his features, he reaches old age in two or sometimes three seconds.

I felt, then, that I was in the presence a painting of a lacustrine type. The swan was looking at me head on and fixedly, and the father and daughter, though only a few meters from where I sat, pretended to be absorbed in contemplating the environs. When the waiter emerged from the building to come to me, the swan began to retreat, surely thanks to the reverse capability of the pedal mechanism. It seemed to me to be backing off in order to make a final charge, but it promptly whirled around, pointing its tail to the right, and set off at once in forward gear. The pedalinho left the shore behind; I could now see the heads of the crew peeking out above the animal’s hindquarters, probably unaware of what they were leaving behind them. A second later, the waiter arrived and I ordered a coffee.