Some people seem to be gifted with a natural talent for art.
Yes, they work at it, but they also possess some God-given ability
that allows them to channel beauty into their selected medium.
Some people seem to be gifted with a natural talent for art. Yes, they work at it, but they also possess some God-given ability that allows them to channel beauty into their selected medium. If you are one of these people, please hand this column to the Neanderthal you live with. This is for him (Yes, it’s probably a “him”).
This is for the rest of us. If I were to embark on a life-long quest to capture the human form on paper, I would never do better than a stick man. If, like me, the right side of your brain is dead or dormant, your artistic canvas is probably more mundane. My canvas is the Christmas tree. In the world of “real” art, one is told that there are no rules; the only limits are your creative imagination. Then they tell you to go to school for four years to learn the right way to do it. In the same way, some people will suggest that decorating the Christmas tree is an undisciplined orgy of light-stringing and ornament-hanging.
Not so. Yes, there is creative latitude, but this must be done within constraints. Let me explain. Many years ago when free-range trees were available, the Christmas tree buyer judged a tree by how “full” it was. “Gee, Bob, that’s a great tree. It sure is full.” This was the highest compliment. This was back when the highest compliment you could pay a photographer was, “Wow, all your pictures came out.”
The leaders of our free enterprise system noticed this customer preference and began raising trees in fenced and guarded christmastreetion camps. They trimmed the prisoner trees to be so full and dense that if your baseball disappeared into one, there was no hope of finding it. Decorations could only be place on the tips of the branches.
This is the first lesson in choosing and preparing your tree. If you purchase a pine or a Douglas fir, it has no doubt been pruned so that no light will pass through. When you get it home, place it in the stand and grab your pruning shears. Start cutting. After you remove and thin branches for a while, stand back and take a look. When your reaction is, “Oh my God, I’ve stripped it naked,” you are half done. If you are among the privileged few who can afford a noble fir, you may not need to perform this task.
My father, a noted tree decorator at our house, taught me years ago the rule of lights: If a little is good, a lot is better. (NOTE: This rule applies to some other things, too.) Take an inventory of your Christmas tree lights. Go out and buy that many lights again. Now you have enough. String the lights around and through the tree, filling all those open spaces you opened with your pruning shears. This gives your tree what “real” artists call depth.
Follow the same rule with your ornaments. Hang them in toward the trunk of the tree as well as near the branch tips. All that bare nakedness that frightened you while you were pruning now makes your living room look like Time Square.
So, let your creativity loose, but stay within these guidelines. Here are a few additional tips from the American Christmas Tree Decorating Council:
• No decorator trees. If you want a flocked tree with all blue ornaments and all red lights, move to the Marina District in San Francisco.
• No flashing lights. They’re annoying.
To all of us who are artistically challenged, prepare your canvas, decorate your canvas, but remember the rules.
