{"id":556,"date":"2025-03-03T22:13:45","date_gmt":"2025-03-04T06:13:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/?p=556"},"modified":"2025-03-03T22:13:45","modified_gmt":"2025-03-04T06:13:45","slug":"uncle-josh-on-finishing-the-hat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/2025\/03\/03\/uncle-josh-on-finishing-the-hat\/","title":{"rendered":"Uncle Josh on Finishing the Hat"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>My church choir does an annual fundraiser of Broadway tunes. This year I tried to sing &#8220;Finishing the Hat&#8221; from Sondheim&#8217;s\u00a0<em>Sunday in the Park with George<\/em>. I even painted two pointillism hats to donate to the auction that accompanies the show every year.<\/p>\n<p>Let&#8217;s just say that several mistakes were made.<\/p>\n<p>I am a failed art student. Back in the 90&#8217;s I thought I was going to go into theater professionally, but my girlfriend at the time pushed me into art and graphic design. I cannot draw. At least, I couldn&#8217;t draw without looking at the paper like the teachers wanted me to. My natural technique of sketching loose lines horrified my negative-space addicted instructors. Computers were just becoming a useful tool in art and my first graphic design instructor didn&#8217;t trust them because he didn&#8217;t know how to use them. By my last year I was an expert in Freehand and Quark X Press, which everyone uses today, right?<span class=\"footnote_referrer\"><a role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_556_1('footnote_plugin_reference_556_1_1');\" onkeypress=\"footnote_moveToReference_556_1('footnote_plugin_reference_556_1_1');\" ><sup id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_556_1_1\" class=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text\">[1]<\/sup><\/a><span id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_556_1_1\" class=\"footnote_tooltip\">Fortunately user documentation was really good and taught principles and how the apps got there. They also came in box sets. I regret dumping those books because they were excellent. Even Microsoft&nbsp;&#x2026; <span class=\"footnote_tooltip_continue\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_556_1('footnote_plugin_reference_556_1_1');\">Continue reading<\/span><\/span><\/span><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_556_1_1').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_556_1_1', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });<\/script> Anyway my degree ended up being in &#8220;Liberal Arts&#8221; which is a generic get-out-of-college kind of degree.<\/p>\n<p>The art supplies have been in storage for decades. The local Craft Warehouse is closing, and everything is on sale, and I had this shoot-for-the-moon idea to actually paint a hat for both shows. A lot of money was spent on paper and paints. A lot of time was spent trying to figure out how to paint like Seurat. A lot of time was spent painting.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_557\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-557\" style=\"width: 226px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-557\" src=\"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/PXL_20250216_030720756-226x300.jpg\" alt=\"Watercolor woman's hat done in a Seurat pastiche.\" width=\"226\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/PXL_20250216_030720756-226x300.jpg 226w, https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/PXL_20250216_030720756-771x1024.jpg 771w, https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/PXL_20250216_030720756-768x1020.jpg 768w, https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/PXL_20250216_030720756-1157x1536.jpg 1157w, https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/PXL_20250216_030720756-1542x2048.jpg 1542w, https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/PXL_20250216_030720756-scaled.jpg 1928w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 226px) 100vw, 226px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-557\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">&#8220;The Hat&#8221; based on Seurat&#8217;s A Sunday Afternoon on the island of La Grande Jatte<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>A total of $25 was raised in the auction by them. Because a friend bought one.<span class=\"footnote_referrer\"><a role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_556_1('footnote_plugin_reference_556_1_2');\" onkeypress=\"footnote_moveToReference_556_1('footnote_plugin_reference_556_1_2');\" ><sup id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_556_1_2\" class=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text\">[2]<\/sup><\/a><span id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_556_1_2\" class=\"footnote_tooltip\">The auction brought in over $5,000 over two nights, so my raindrop wouldn&#8217;t have been missed.<\/span><\/span><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_556_1_2').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_556_1_2', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });<\/script><\/p>\n<p>But what this travesty has done in unlocked my old desire to create art.<\/p>\n<p>The idea of pointillism appears to me in a mathematical way. I had hoped to use only the primary colors, but as I have also spent a lot of time in ray tracing and computer graphics, I&#8217;m used to an RGB color model instead of using the CMYK model paints use. Creating the color blending only with points is actually not how Seurat painted. There was a basic wash of color and then instead of dots, he used small strokes, which I used to indicate the woven texture I thought the hat would have been made out of, although it&#8217;s quite possible the hat was actually felt. He used more than three basic colors for everything, too.<\/p>\n<p>The next travesty was my performance of the song which I won&#8217;t torture anyone with. Lets just say I learned a few important things:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Sondheim can be fucking tough to sing.<\/li>\n<li>Mandy Patinkin is a hard act to follow (as is Jake Gyllenhaal)<\/li>\n<li>Even dropping the key down wasn&#8217;t enough for me to hit the high notes successfully.<\/li>\n<li>I completely failed in my preparation of the song.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>I did not practice nearly enough, or well enough. I tried visualizing my performance, but most every time I thought &#8220;here&#8217;s my song&#8221; the song I sang last year came out of my mouth<span class=\"footnote_referrer\"><a role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_556_1('footnote_plugin_reference_556_1_3');\" onkeypress=\"footnote_moveToReference_556_1('footnote_plugin_reference_556_1_3');\" ><sup id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_556_1_3\" class=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text\">[3]<\/sup><\/a><span id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_556_1_3\" class=\"footnote_tooltip\">&#8221;Who I&#8217;d Be&#8221; from <em>Shrek<\/em><\/span><\/span><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_556_1_3').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_556_1_3', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });<\/script>.<\/p>\n<p>In the end I couldn&#8217;t remember the words and I couldn&#8217;t hit the notes. I am disappointed in myself for these failures and for letting my bad mood affect others. The importance of paying attention is yet another lesson I have to re-learn.<\/p>\n<div class=\"speaker-mute footnotes_reference_container\"> <div class=\"footnote_container_prepare\"><p><span role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" class=\"footnote_reference_container_label pointer\" onclick=\"footnote_expand_collapse_reference_container_556_1();\">Digressions<\/span><span role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" class=\"footnote_reference_container_collapse_button\" style=\"display: none;\" onclick=\"footnote_expand_collapse_reference_container_556_1();\">[<a id=\"footnote_reference_container_collapse_button_556_1\">+<\/a>]<\/span><\/p><\/div> <div id=\"footnote_references_container_556_1\" style=\"\"><table class=\"footnotes_table footnote-reference-container\"><caption class=\"accessibility\">Digressions<\/caption> <tbody> \r\n\r\n<tr class=\"footnotes_plugin_reference_row\"> <th scope=\"row\" class=\"footnote_plugin_index_combi pointer\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToAnchor_556_1('footnote_plugin_tooltip_556_1_1');\"><a id=\"footnote_plugin_reference_556_1_1\" class=\"footnote_backlink\"><span class=\"footnote_index_arrow\">&#8593;<\/span>1<\/a><\/th> <td class=\"footnote_plugin_text\">Fortunately user documentation was really good and taught principles and how the apps got there. They also came in box sets. I regret dumping those books because they were excellent. Even Microsoft Word 5 for the Mac had incredible documentation. Now everyone farms out to ad-infesting blogs and YouTube videos.<\/td><\/tr>\r\n\r\n<tr class=\"footnotes_plugin_reference_row\"> <th scope=\"row\" class=\"footnote_plugin_index_combi pointer\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToAnchor_556_1('footnote_plugin_tooltip_556_1_2');\"><a id=\"footnote_plugin_reference_556_1_2\" class=\"footnote_backlink\"><span class=\"footnote_index_arrow\">&#8593;<\/span>2<\/a><\/th> <td class=\"footnote_plugin_text\">The auction brought in over $5,000 over two nights, so my raindrop wouldn&#8217;t have been missed.<\/td><\/tr>\r\n\r\n<tr class=\"footnotes_plugin_reference_row\"> <th scope=\"row\" class=\"footnote_plugin_index_combi pointer\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToAnchor_556_1('footnote_plugin_tooltip_556_1_3');\"><a id=\"footnote_plugin_reference_556_1_3\" class=\"footnote_backlink\"><span class=\"footnote_index_arrow\">&#8593;<\/span>3<\/a><\/th> <td class=\"footnote_plugin_text\">&#8221;Who I&#8217;d Be&#8221; from <em>Shrek<\/em><\/td><\/tr>\r\n\r\n <\/tbody> <\/table> <\/div><\/div><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> function footnote_expand_reference_container_556_1() { jQuery('#footnote_references_container_556_1').show(); jQuery('#footnote_reference_container_collapse_button_556_1').text('\u2212'); } function footnote_collapse_reference_container_556_1() { jQuery('#footnote_references_container_556_1').hide(); jQuery('#footnote_reference_container_collapse_button_556_1').text('+'); } function footnote_expand_collapse_reference_container_556_1() { if (jQuery('#footnote_references_container_556_1').is(':hidden')) { footnote_expand_reference_container_556_1(); } else { footnote_collapse_reference_container_556_1(); } } function footnote_moveToReference_556_1(p_str_TargetID) { footnote_expand_reference_container_556_1(); var l_obj_Target = jQuery('#' + p_str_TargetID); if (l_obj_Target.length) { jQuery( 'html, body' ).delay( 0 ); jQuery('html, body').animate({ scrollTop: l_obj_Target.offset().top - window.innerHeight * 0.2 }, 380); } } function footnote_moveToAnchor_556_1(p_str_TargetID) { footnote_expand_reference_container_556_1(); var l_obj_Target = jQuery('#' + p_str_TargetID); if (l_obj_Target.length) { jQuery( 'html, body' ).delay( 0 ); jQuery('html, body').animate({ scrollTop: l_obj_Target.offset().top - window.innerHeight * 0.2 }, 380); } }<\/script>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>My church choir does an annual fundraiser of Broadway tunes. This year I tried to sing &#8220;Finishing the Hat&#8221; from Sondheim&#8217;s\u00a0Sunday in the Park with George. I even painted two pointillism hats to donate to the auction that accompanies the show every year. Let&#8217;s just say that several mistakes were made. I am a failed &hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"federated","footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"1"},"categories":[163],"tags":[213,211,212],"class_list":["post-556","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art-for-arts-sake","tag-art","tag-broadway-night","tag-watercolor"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/wandering.shop\/@UncleJosh\/114102686755813715","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=556"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":560,"href":"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556\/revisions\/560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joshuarenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}