IWSC Summer Camp
Round 2 - Painting
Cabin: McGonagall
Word Count: 3019
Finally, after decades of parents and students alike asking for the curriculum to be updated, Hogwarts added Magical Fine Arts as an elective.
Dean Thomas had never been so excited in his life. From a young age, his mum had encouraged his love of art, providing him with the best supplies they could afford. Seeing art move and interact with people had lit a fire in Dean since his first day at Hogwarts. He needed to learn how to breathe life into his creations like the artists who gave their creations to the school breathed life into theirs.
Then came the first day of class. They were to paint a bowl of fruit and enchant one of the pieces to react in a similar manner to the ticklish pear. Dean and a few others with Muggle ancestry were among the last ones finished. They were also the only ones to have bothered with sketching outlines and similar preparatory work.
"Really, Mister Thomas, the aim is to draw a bowl of fruit, not a checkerboard," the teacher had commented.
"Didn't you get the memo, Halfblood? This is Magical Fine Arts, not Primitive Muggle Art!" Malfoy taunted.
The Pureblood was so busy taunting Dean that he never realized that Dean's fruit was the most realistic-looking of the lot.
Pansy, who had noticed the artistic discrepancy, however, chose to demean Dean's art in a different way.
"The fruit's supposed to do something, Idiot, not just sit there," she'd laughed.
Indeed, Dean had put so much effort into making his fruit bowl look right, that he'd neglected to make it magical.
This pattern continued for much of the semester. Eventually, all those who had had prior non-magical artistic training ceased to employ such steps due to the cruelty of their peers and the lack of understanding found in their teacher. Everyone except Dean Thomas, that was.
As much as Dean wanted to create magical masterpieces, doing so at the cost of his unique artistic style would be akin to cutting off his own hand. And so, he continued to prepare his canvas meticulously and draw the most realistic creations possible. He did so even at the expense of being told that he would not be permitted to use the glazed finishes necessary to bring his pieces to life unless he finished on time with the other students. Because of this, he consistently received Trolls in the grade book, but that didn't matter to him.
Being ready for the Spring Art Festival did.
At the end of the school year, all the art students would have the opportunity to present their pieces to some of the greatest magical art critics of their time. Rumor had it that Jean Claude Montesque, the premiere artist might even come and choose one of them for a summer apprenticeship.
Dean would love nothing more than to catch the eye of Montseque. With the opportunity to train under an expert in the field, one day he could be a world-renowned artist! But how could he do so when the majority of his pieces lacked any semblance of magical quality at all?
Help came from an unexpected source late one Friday evening.
Dean was just putting the finishing touches on his latest masterpiece (considered 'boring' and 'uninspired' by his peers for its lack of magical wildlife) when he felt something cold on his shoulder.
Startled, he turned around to find the room empty but for him and… The Grey Lady.
Her gaze seemed strangely focused for a ghost, focused on the forest scene he had created. Her fingers lightly touched the likeness of a young squirrel Dean had just finished. Had she been alive, the finer details would have smeared; as it was, her fingers went ever-so-slightly through the canvas.
"It's magnificent." Dean almost missed the words whispered in reverence.
An eternity passed in which The Grey Lady took in the painting's details while Dean took in the presence of the first person to praise his work all year.
The stillness was broken by an explosion in a nearby classroom. Peeves' familiar cackle could be heard as well as Filch's angry cry against the chaotic poltergeist.
The Grey Lady turned to face Dean.
"Your talents are stifled in this place. Come at sunrise, and we shall move your masterpieces to a studio worthy of one such as yourself," she whispered before bidding him goodnight.
Needless to say, Dean did not sleep a wink that night. Finally, finally, the barest hint of sunlight could be seen on the horizon, and Dean had the opportunity to sneak away to the art classroom.
The Grey Lady awaited him, a lone house-elf putting his latest piece carefully into a trunk for ease of transport. A quick sweep of the eye told Dean that all of his other works were likewise packed away.
At The Grey Lady's nod, Dean quickly picked up the trunk, surprised to see that it was light as a feather.
"I asked Twindle to make it lighter," she explained at his confused look. "Now come, follow me!" She bid before swiftly leaving the room and heading toward the staircase. Thankfully, they met no one on their journey to the seventh floor.
Finally, she had him enter a room he'd never seen before.
"This is the Room of Requirement. Any being who would pass this wall thrice while focusing on their need will find it in this room. I had the elves create it according to specific requirements, but now that you know of its presence, you can come and change it to be whatever you need, young artist," she explained softly as he walked in.
At one side of the room were easels aplenty from which he could add finishing touches to his creations. The walls were filled with frames just waiting to be filled with his pieces. There was a wheel for pottery, and a window that seemed willing to present any scene he could request. In the back was a shelf filled with all the materials talked about in class, including the glazes necessary to bring movement to a still image.
Dean couldn't wait to see what his art could turn into with the supplies found here! Perhaps he had a chance to impress the critics after all! Gentle laughter like windchimes reminded Dean that he wasn't alone in this place. Turning around, he sought to apologize and express his appreciation for The Grey Lady's help, but she was nowhere in sight. Instead, an animated portrait looked down at him.
"I take it you like this room, Child?" she asked. The lady in the painting bore a remarkable resemblance to The Grey Lady but wore a piece of jewelry that Dean had only seen before in Hogwarts, a History. This was Rowena Ravenclaw, one of the founders.
"V-very much so, Milady Ravenclaw," Dean stuttered.
"My daughter tells me you have a talent for art. What do you say to showing me your best pieces?" the founder asked kindly.
"When I was alive, I taught many a student how to bring life to their art. I'd enjoy the opportunity to do so once again," she sighed softly.
And so, heart thundering at the surrealness of the situation, Dean did as she bid.
He spent the majority of his weekend hidden away in an artist's paradise. Lady Rowena delighted in the clever non-magical tricks he used to create pieces with depth and motion, and Dean loved finally having an opportunity to breathe magical life into his creations.
His many works seemed to enjoy interacting with one another. The squirrel that had so attracted the attention of The Grey Lady frequently visited his fruit bowl to partake in a bite or two of yummy food. Once it left the portrait, the fruit would return to the bowl as whole as it had been when he first painted it.
"Am I wasting my time trying to cultivate my artistic ability?" Dean asked one day after hauling his most recent creation from class to the Room of Requirement. Today had been especially filled with taunts from his fellow students that the professor did nothing to prevent. Dean knew that The Grey Lady and Lady Rowena enjoyed his work, but sometimes, it really felt as though he was wasting his efforts.
"Apply the glaze," Lady Rowena told him instead of answering his question.
Immediately, the songbirds Dean had painted left their portrait in favor of the forest scene that his squirrel called home.
"None of your creations stay within their frames. Do you know why?" Lady Rowena asked him.
Remembering all his classmates' portraits that moved in carefully prescribed ways and rarely if ever left their pieces, Dean suggested dejectedly, "Because I'm not applying the magic correctly?"
The sound of laughter met Dean's ears, causing him to flinch. He'd heard enough laughter and jeers in class, thank you very much.
Of course, Lady Rowena's eagle eyes would see his reaction. She quickly sobered and sought to correct his presumption.
"Magical artists spend decades perfecting the craft. Your teacher focuses on the simplest of methods. It is easy to record a prescribed action on a painting. It takes much more effort, both magically and artistically, to give one's creations something resembling free-will. You ask if you're wasting your time? The only way in which you are wasting your time is in learning under a simpleton who is incapable of seeing the beauty of your pieces because they use methods he is unfamiliar with!" Rowena explained haughtily. She was quite angry at the professor who made such a talented student doubt himself.
Rowena's ire towards the art teacher only increased in the weeks leading up to the Spring Art Festival. Her daughter, Helena, had taken to observing Dean's classes and was horrified at what she'd seen. The majority of the class seemed utterly oblivious to Dean's talents and teased him mercilessly for his time-consuming methods. What was more, one of the more homely girls in the class had more than once taken steps to sabotage Dean's work. It was exceedingly obvious to both the ghost and portrait that this individual had a slight understanding of Dean's abilities and viewed him as a potential threat. The teacher, of course, did nothing to curb either the bullying or the blatant destruction of Dean's art.
After the girl (Pansy Parkinson as Dean called her) 'accidentally' destroyed his third attempt at creating a self portrait sculpture for the show, Rowena suggested he make use of the pottery space in the Room of Requirement. That suggestion was eagerly accepted though Dean had the room create a partition that prevented Rowena from observing his efforts. Making wildlife was much easier for him than creating people, and he desperately wanted to do this on his own. It took several weeks, but eventually Dean seemed happy with the result though he still refused to show Rowena what he had made.
Finally, it was the week of the Spring Art Festival. Fearing further sabotage from Pansy, Dean avoided setting up his display until the night before the show. One of the corridors had been transformed to have a museum-like quality to it. The best and brightest students were given their own rooms while more lackluster students had their best pieces displayed on the walls leading down the hall. Dean was horrified, but not surprised, to see that the placard displaying where his pieces were to go was at the very end of the hall, a hidden alcove that would no doubt go unnoticed by the majority of visitors.
Nonetheless, Dean arranged his various paintings and the sculpture to the best of his ability in the cramped space, hoping against hope that somehow they might catch Jean Claude's eye. With a stern warning to his creations to remain still until showtime (still fearing some form of sabotage), Dean went to bed.
Dean sighed. In mere minutes, the first of the visitors would begin walking down the halls. His stomach in knots, he looked at each of his creations to make sure they were reasonably behaving themselves. After Rowena's explanation, he didn't mind if they moved between each other, but he didn't want to risk one of his peers getting credit for one of his creations. Predictably, most of the birds were found in the forest scene. One of them appeared to be delighting in taking small bites out of the apple in his fruit bowl, however. His statue stood center-stage, ready to play with whoever entered the alcove. It seemed like everyone was there… wait, where was Squirrel?
"Remind me why I'm here again?" Jean Claude moaned to his wife, Suzette, pathetically. He hated these functions. Everything around him looked like it could be drawn by a child and animated by accidental magic. There was nothing that called to him in the least.
"You bet the school's art teacher that he would never get hired in such a capacity and lost, my dear. Apparently he's used your presence as incentive for the budding artists. You don't want to disappoint the students, now do you?" Suzette calmly explained without a hint of sympathy for Jean. The man loved to make bets on the most juvenile of subjects but hated paying up.
Jean Claude nodded grumpily and pretended to pay attention to the various pieces until one of them caused Suzette to burst into laughter.
"Jean, you must look at this! There's a squirrel riding this ship!" she declared excitedly.
And indeed there was! The squirrel winked at his audience cheekily as he crawled up sails of a pirate ship to see what he could see. As Jean Claude looked closer at the little fellow, however, he noted that the amount of detail that had gone into creating the furry creature far surpassed that of the boat. Why, he almost looked life-like!
To the surprise of everyone but Jean Claude and Suzette (who was an expert in her own right on the arts), the squirrel suddenly leapt out of the portrait of a pirate ship and into a neighboring piece depicting a Quidditch match. The image was depressingly boring as each piece reset itself after fifteen seconds of play. None of the 'players' even appeared to notice the squirrel jumping on their heads to get to the other side.
On and on it went. The squirrel going from painting to painting and the world-famous painter and his wife following it determined to discover its creator. Finally, they were at the end of the hall, but the squirrel appeared to have disappeared.
As they took a moment to catch their breath, a voice could be heard.
"I told you to stay with the others! What do you think you were doing gallavanting with the other paintings? What if one of the critics thought someone else made you? Did you even think of what would have happened if Pansy had caught sight of you? She's seen enough of my work to know I created you. I wouldn't be shocked in the least if she'd tried to destroy anything with you in it," the voice berated.
The couple edged closer to the sound and were surprised to find the final art student in a hidden alcove as if his pieces were something to be ashamed of. To the contrary, both Jean Claude and Suzette could not help but clap their hands in wonder as a griffin greeted them, and animals of all sizes freely walked from frame to frame seemingly without a care.
"Are you the artist of all these beautiful works?" Jean asked a young teen who seemed to have been rendered speechless on seeing them.
"Y-yes, sir. M-my name's Dean Thomas, sir." the youth said while pointing to a placard with his name on it.
"What's the name of this delightful griffin?" Suzette asked as the figurine pushed her to the ground and started trying to groom her hair with its beak. The griffin was the only, non-realistic creature of the lot, painted in shades of gold and blue.
"That's Deanie," Dean explained while blushing wildly.
Dean knew that all his peers had created human figurines to represent themselves, but he just couldn't do it. Besides, Deanie was a symbol not only of himself but also of the tutelage he had been given by Lady Rowena. He was a lion taught to fly by an eagle. A griffin seemed appropriate, but now he wondered if Deanie wouldn't be the downfall of his exhibit. Who creates a blue and gold griffin, after all, to say nothing of completely neglecting to show any ability to showcase the human form! Humans were the most common form created by magical art!
Thankfully, Jean Claude spoke up before Dean could send himself into a panic attack.
"You have true potential to be great, Dean Thomas. Your creations have a life to them that is uncommon, and you show both a dedication to realism and a willingness to go beyond what is real," here he gestured to the gold and blue griffin, "that I can appreciate. I note a lack of humans in your art. Would I be correct in assuming that this is an area in which you struggle?"
Ashamed, Dean nodded while looking at the ground.
Jean Claude gently lifted his chin, forcing Dean to look him in the eyes. "What would you say to an apprenticeship with me over the summer? Under my tutelage, you could truly become a master," he asked with an excited twinkle in his eye.
It was everything he had wanted, everything he'd striven for since he signed up for Magical Art Class. There was only one response that he could give, but his tongue was stuck to the roof of his mouth. Out of the corner of his eye, Dean saw the ghostly visage of The Grey Lady nod to him in encouragement. Underneath, in the almost permanently empty canvas where he'd drawn his song birds, Rowena likewise nodded to him before disappearing from sight.
His tongue loosened, the boy grinned and shouted, "Where do I sign up?"