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Shaun Tan - "Never Forget the Password" - oil on canvas
Never Forget the Password
Oil on canvas by Shaun Tan (2012).
Artwork size: 86 x 76 cm (33.9" x 29.9")
Frame size: 88.5 x 78.5 x 4.7 cm (34.8" x 30.9" x 1.9")
"A simple contrast between soft golden light and grey buildings, inside and outside, with a small portal in between (very similar ideas are presented in my picture book and film The Lost Thing, a utopian world within a drab city).:
"The experience of denied access is familiar to everyone, and it’s particularly galling when it comes from a sibling who, for whatever reason, is lucky enough to have the upper hand, the ultimate petty bureaucrat, taking pleasure in being arbitrarily punitive. It’s a darker turn in the narrative, a sense that the older boy wilfully mean rather than oblivious or impatient. The younger boy finally ‘asks for a reason’, and of course there isn’t one, at least not a just one. This naturally leads to a fight."
"When painting this picture I’d been reading reports by early European visitors to the coast of New Zealand, describing a massive ‘dawn chorus’ of birdsong coming from the forest (relatively silent now due to rats and other introduced animals). I imagined this walled garden as a secret Eden of small birds and insects, a place of peace and enlightenment. In early concept sketches for Rules of Summer, a similar space featured a birthday party, the young boy refused entry for forgetting to bring a gift. On balance this idea seemed too similar to the ‘parade’ image and I wanted something more open to interpretation. The focus remains on a place you might desperately wish to visit, but never can. I’m reminded here of a H.G. Wells short story that left a strong impression on me as a young reader, ‘The Door in the Wall’, about a man who spends his life trying to locate a lost green door he once opened as a child to witness ‘immortal realities’. A similar idea recurs, I’ve noticed, in many of my stories, including Rules of Summer." —Shaun Tan