This is how the painting of a seagull on a pillar of a bridge was announced in a newspaper headline: “Seagull as a symbol of disobedience”. Inspired by Richard Bach’s novel, I wanted to paint a bird with its wings spread wide, which shows its free spirit and defies the force. His flight is out of time that wants to identify him with something he does not like because it puts pressure on his river and takes away its soul. That’s why his screach cannot be heard. The noise of machines is heard instead and walls are being built where his empire was once larger than his horizon. He is a city seagull, born to be proud and true to himself. His feelings are clear and they lift him to fly. The flight is a joy of his life unlike the safety of a cage he could have. Every day, the joy is growing and he is getting farther, his feathers no longer white, because his city has also turned grey. He will not fly any more to that prisonlike side of the river, which goads the sky and threatens him. It’s freedom or death. You live only once, and the flight is eternal. Let it remain so as long as there are memories of the seagull that has given away its flight to a pillar of a bridge. He could not give away the shores of his life, but he did want to. “Jonathan Livingston Seagull loved TO FLY!” will be engraved in the memory of the bridge of the lost river…Yea, it will thus continue to run till the end of time while the sky is getting written on by the flight. “If our friendship depended on things like space and time, then, when we finally overcome space and time, we’d destroy our own brotherhood! Should we overcom space, all we have left is HERE. Should we overcome time, all we have left is NOW. Don’t you think our paths might cross from time to time somewhere between Here and Now?” “Goodbye, Sully. We’ll meet again” said Jonathan joining in his mind a large gull-flock on the shores of another time realising with well-practiced ease that he was not just feathers and bones but a perfect symbol of freedom and flight, limited by nothing at all.”
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Jedan novinski naslov oslikavanje galeba na pilonu mosta najavio je ovako: „Galeb kao simbol nepristajanja“.
Inspirisan romanom Ričarda Baha želeo sam da oslikam pticu široko raširenih krila, koja tako pokazuje svoj slobodarski duh i prkosi sili. Njagov let je izvan vremena koje bi da ga poistoveti sa nečim što ne voli, jer mu pritiska reku i uzima joj dušu. Zato mu se i ne čuje krik. Umesto njega glasaju se mašine i rastu zidine gde mu beše carstvo od pogleda veće. On je gradski galeb, rođen da bude ponosan i samo svoj. Njagova osećanja su čista i uzdižu ga da leti. Let je radost njegovom životu, a ne sigurnost krletke koju bi mogao da ima. Svakoga dana ona je sve veća, a on sve dalji i njegovo perje nije više belo, jer mu je i grad posiveo. Neće više leteti na tu zatvorsku stranu reke što podbada nebo i preti mu. Sloboda ili smrt. Samo jednom se živi, a let je večan.
Neka tako i ostane dok je i sećanja na ovog galeba koji je podario svoj let pilonu jednog mosta. Nije mogao da mu podari obale svog života, ali svakako je to želeo.
„Galeb Džonatan Livingston voleo je DA LETI!“ ‒ ostaće zapisano u sećanju jednog mosta izgubljene reke… Da, ona će i takva teći sve do kraja vremena, dok se nebo ispisuje letom.
„Кada bi naše prijateljstvo zavisilo o vremenu i prostoru, onda bismo, savladavši vreme i prostor, upropastili i naše bratstvo! Savladamo li prostor, ostaje nam samo OVDE. Savladamo li vreme, ostaje nam samo SADA. Zar ne misliš da ćemo se na tom putu, između Sada i Ovde, ipak povremeno sretati?“
„Zbogom, Suly! Do viđenja! Tim rečima se Džonatan oprosti i prenese u mislima među veliko jato galebova, na obalu nekog drugog vremena, i shvati sa uvežbanom lakoćom da nije samo kost i perje, već ničim neograničen, savršen simbol slobode i leta.“
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Location
Sava River
