Polke Post 1 - Happy Birthday, Sigmar Polke! Sigmar Polke tells a story by Marguerite Yourcenar: How Wang-Fu Was Saved

On February 13, 2019, Sigmar Polke would have turned 78 years old. For us, this date is a wonderful occasion to send out the first issue of our newsletter, the POLKE POST. We have just publicly announced the Anna Polke Foundation and have received a great deal of positive feedback. We are delighted about this and would like to express our sincere thanks! Sigmar Polke's work should continue to be recognized, discussed, and researched for years after his death, and we are committed to this with joy, energy, ideas, and dedication. Please contact us if you would like to contribute.

The story is about the elderly painter Wang-Fu and his student Ling, who are traveling together through the Kingdom of Han. Their journey takes them to the outskirts of the imperial city, where they look for an inn to spend the night. At dawn, the emperor's soldiers storm the inn and drag Wang-Fu and Ling to the imperial palace. The emperor sentences Wang-Fu to death and kills his student. Before the sentence is carried out, he orders Wang-Fu to complete one of his works from the imperial collection:

"(…) In my collection of your works, I have a magnificent painting in which the mountains, the river mouths, and the sea are reflected—infinitely diminished, but with a clarity that surpasses that of reality—like figures on the inner wall of a sphere. But this painting is unfinished, Wang-Fu; your masterpiece is still in its early stages. Surely, as you sat painting in the lonely valley, you noticed a bird flying by, or a child running after the bird. (...) Wang-Fu, I want you to use the bright hours that remain to you to finish this painting. It will thus contain the last secrets you have gathered in the course of your long life. (...) Wang began to color the tip of a cloud floating above a mountain pink. Then he added small ripples to the surface of the sea, which deepened the feeling of serenity. The jade floor of the imperial hall became strangely damp, but Wang-Fu was completely absorbed in his work and did not notice that his feet were already standing in water. Under the painter's brushstrokes, the fragile boat grew larger and larger.
It already took up the entire foreground on the silk scroll. From a distance, the regular sound of oars suddenly rang out, quick and lively like the beating of wings. It grew closer and gently filled the entire hall, then stopped. (...) The courtiers stood shoulder-deep in water, and since etiquette forced them to remain motionless, they stood on tiptoe. Finally, the water reached the imperial heart. (...) It was Ling. (...) Wang-Fu said quietly as he continued painting, “I thought you were dead.” “How could I have died,” Ling replied reverently, “when you are alive?” And he helped the master into the boat. The jade ceiling was reflected in the water, so that Ling seemed to be rowing in a grotto. The braids of the flooded courtiers curled on the water, on which the emperor's pale head floated like a lotus flower.
“Look, my student,” said Wang-Fu melancholically. "These wretched people will perish, if they haven't already. I would not have thought that there was enough water in the sea to drown an emperor. (...) Wang-Fu took the helm, and Ling took up the oars. Their strong, heartbeat-like rhythm resounded once more throughout the hall. And already the water level was imperceptibly sinking around the large, vertical rocks, which were once again becoming pillars. Soon only a few puddles glistened in the depressions of the floor. The courtiers' robes were dry, only the emperor had a few flakes of foam left on the fringed hem of his cloak. The painting that Wang-Fu had finished was leaning against a curtain. A boat occupied the entire foreground. But slowly it moved away, and the sea closed over the fine trail it left behind. Already, the faces of the two men sitting in the boat were no longer recognizable. (...) The trail disappeared into the lifeless expanse of water, and the painter Wang-Fu and his student Ling vanished forever into the blue jade sea that Wang-Fu had invented."

(Translated from: Marguerite Yourcenar, Orientalische Erzählungen, Insel-Bücherei Nr. 809, Frankfurt am Main 1964, p. 5–21)

Marguerite Yourcenar (1903, Bruxelles–1987, Northeast Harbour, Maine) was a writer and recipient of the Praemium Erasmianum. She was the first woman to become a member of the Académie française.