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Once upon a time, there was a famous artist. He decided from a very early age that women were nothing but trouble. He poured all of his energy into his artwork. One night, he started to dream about a woman. She was beautiful, and loving, and kind. He woke up with a start, wondering what the dream meant.
He sat down at his sculpting station, trying to clear his head. Absentmindedly, he worked with the clay. After a while, a face started to take shape. It was lovely and feminine. Then a neck; then a torso. When he finally stepped back from his creation, it was a woman. A beautiful woman. She stared at him with kind eyes. Surprised, he almost spoke to her. Realizing that he was being foolish, he left his work station to let the figure dry.
The next day, he walked into his studio. The statue stood there, smiling slightly at him. He walked to the other side of the room to finish a commission that a customer had ordered the other day. Finishing his work, he turned to the statue and jokingly said, “So, what do you think?” The statue looked on approvingly. Pleased with the imagined approval, the artist started working on his next project. This became a regular occurrence; he would ask the statue’s approval after he finished a project.
After a while he started making conversation with the statue, saying what was on his mind or asking her opinion about things. Sometimes he would swear that she answered. One day he walked into his studio, greeted the statue, and gave her a peck on the cheek. He was surprised that he did this, but it just felt so natural. He started bringing things home for the statue; flowers, rings, scarves, anything that he thought she would like. He would eat his meals in his studio, and sometimes make her a plate. The artist had fallen in love with his creation.
Eventually he started wishing for more. He wanted her to answer, to nod, to move, to respond to his kiss. One night, while he was feeling particularly lonely and frustrated about his situation, he decided to leave the studio and collect his thoughts outside. Walking around the empty streets of the city, he passed a fountain. Coins littered the bottom of the water, and along the edge were the words, “What do you wish for?”
Pulling a nickel from his pocket, he gave it a kiss and tossed it in the water, saying, “I wish my statue was a real woman.”
He stood there for a minute, imagining what it would be like if that wish actually came true. Smiling to himself, he started his journey home.
When he got back to his home, he heard something rummaging around in the studio. Scared, he grabbed a broom that was leaning up against the wall. He cautiously stepped into his studio and flipped on the lights. There was nothing out of the ordinary. Breathing a sigh of relief, he set down the broom and greeted his statue with a kiss. He heard a gasp and felt the statue pull away. He opened his eyes and saw his statue staring back at him.
She spoke, saying, “What on Earth did you do that for?”
“You can speak! You are real!” he cried, moving in to hug her.
She shrank away, confused. “Who are you?”
“I created you. I love you. I wished that you would become real, and you did! Now we can live together and be happy.”
“Okay,” she replied hesitantly. He moved in for a kiss, which she accepted.
The next morning, the artist was cooking breakfast, whistling happily. He filled two plates, and walked around looking for his love. He found her in the studio, looking at some of his other pieces of art. She was staring at one painting in particular.
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” he said, “I made it for you.”
“I don’t like it very much,” she said, “It looks too sloppy. Why would you think that I would like anything like this? The colors are dreary and it feels forced. You should try again.”
Taken aback, he vowed to make her something that she would enjoy. She found fault with everything he made.
He soon found that living with her was not perfect either. She didn’t like the music that he listened to, or the books he read, or his hobbies or interests. He soon came to realize that he didn’t like anything that she enjoyed either. Both were unwilling to budge for the other’s interests. They started disagreeing about everything, and that led to fighting. One day he came home to find her packing, getting ready to leave. He dropped to his knees, begging her not to go.
“I love you,” he cried, “You were created for me to love. You are the woman from my dream!”
“You don’t love me,” she replied, “You love the idea of me. I am not an image or dream anymore, I am a living, breathing person, and I deserve to be loved for who I am. I deserve to find someone who I love. Goodbye.”
He fell to the floor, heartbroken.
Author's Note (Edited): In the original story from Ovid's Metamorphoses, Pygmalion, I didn't like how the main character lived happily ever after. The story is about a man who created a woman out of stone, and fell in love with it. He pleaded with a goddess to have her come to life, and she did. They live happily ever after because the man got what he wanted. The readers never know whether she, the statue, consented to the union after she 'came to life,' or even if she had the freedom or ability to choose her own destiny. Because of this, I decided to tweak the ending, with the woman realizing that they were not meant to be a couple. I changed the setting a bit, to make it feel more modern, and had the wishing well be the cause of the wish coming true, not a goddess. In the original story, the main character thought that women were wicked, so originally I was going to have the statue be everything that he thought that women were. However, writing that version felt rather spiteful (also it would prove that his reasoning was right), so I decided to tone down the wickedness and just make them wrong for each other. I changed the title from "The Statue" to "The Artist's Creation" because I wanted it to sound a little like Frankenstein's Monster. I believe this story slightly parallels Frankenstein's Monster in a sense that a person (Frankenstein/the Artist) created something (monster/creation), it came to life, and the living version did not behave as they expected. This better encompasses the theme of this story, as The Statue was a vague description. I also wanted the title to still be about the woman/statue. The new title now implies that the artist feels ownership of the woman/statue, which she proves in the end is not true.
Bibliography: Ovid's Metamorphoses, translated by Tony Kline (2000) Web Source
Picture: By Leobrynn - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons
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