A Macaw Canvas

There was red, yellow, green and blue paint. There was a nude woman standing in front of me. It was called 'live art', and the theme was "Scarlet". That was unique. I didn't know what to create, so I did what every artist did: I examined the nude woman for the sole purpose of creating a visionary painting in my mind. As was everyone else.

Looking at her, she reminded me of an endangered species, standing all bare and exposed out there in the open. On that platform, she was seen by everyone. We were all judging her; examining her. It was like she was about to be poached; her vulnerabilities being hunted for. Is that what a woman felt when men hunted them? Did men make women feel endangered? Endangered by men who only wanted women for their bodies? Endangered because of trafficking or adulteress motives?

I watched her, as the table turned and snapped pictures of every curve in her body. What endangered specie was she? It was on the tip of my tongue, but I couldn't get it out. Her eyes were staring out, the pupils dilated and focused. Her nose was long and pointed, like a small beak of a bird. Her lips were thin and her neck was long. She was standing up straight, making her neck look even longer than it probably was. She had posture and pose, and age left little to the imagination. I noticed the lines under her eyes and the crows feet. Her hands were on her bare hips, creating an illusion of open wings, craving to fly. Her legs were long, straight and sturdy. Her butt created a unique curve that contrasted with her small, saggy chest. She was aged but beautiful.

A bird: that was it. She was an endangered bird. I looked again at the red, yellow, green and blue paint. What did these colors remind me of? What place? What bird? A beach. An island. The tropics. The yellow reminded me of sun rays shining down on deep waters and sandy beaches. The green reminded me of the vast square miles and trees, plants and forest preserved and rehabilitated for the wildlife animals. And finally the red. It was scarlet: a brilliant red. It reminded me of the ceramic and concrete Spanish style roofs from a tropical resort. What else was brilliant? Birds... they were brilliant. And so it came to me. Her body was the canvas, and a scarlet bird was the vision.

So I painted, my hands gracefully moving and shifting every which way, the vision coming to life and my hands being exposed to her body, but touched with care and respect. I painted black around her eyes, and a patch of white going up and beyond her eyebrows. I painted her nose black, and painted black stripes going down her neck. I painted her hair-- yes, her hair-- a scarlet red. I traced the red paint down her back, along her shoulders and blades of her back. I then grabbed the deep yellow and painted the curves of her chest and down the back of her spine. At the indention of her hips and roundness of her butt, I pictured the tail feathers. I moved onto the royal blue and painted her lower body until I reached the knees. The finishing touch: another round of scarlet red to close the elegant ration of bright colors of a scarlet Macaw bird. It only seemed fitting: an endangered bird being exposed on a woman whose body is seen the same.

I admired my masterpiece. And others did too. It was beautiful. She was beautiful. And she no longer looked endangered, vulnerable or hunted. She stood there with grace and elegance, the way that a bird does before soaring free. She lifted her arms, releasing the hands once placed on her hips. The colors going down her arms expanded like the wingspan of a tropical bird. The vision was live. It was the beauty of one species to another. It was the beauty of displaying the world that both a woman's body and an endangered bird were to be displayed as art, not another living and breathing thing.

Standing before me, for all to see was the Scarlet Macaw: its endangered features, its tropical colors and its representation upon the body of equal statue. It was the Macaw canvas. I was exposing the beauty of one species to another. I mean, how could one possibly endanger such a beautiful bird if it is equal to that of a beautiful woman?