"Oil is slow," Rembrandt said one day, watching him lay down the final glaze over a face.
"Like grief. Like forgiveness. It must breathe between layers. Let it dry. Let it live."
⋯
He didn't just paint people.
He painted silence.
He painted what couldn't speak: the forgotten corners of a life that had followed him from one world to another like unshakable shadows.
There were no faces. No friends. No family. He had none.
Instead, the first canvas bore the image of a cracked ceramic bowl placed on a chipped wooden table—the kind found in orphanage kitchens. Behind it, a cold window fogged by breath, and beyond that, a winter so white it hurt to look at. A spoon rested inside the bowl, bent, used, never his.
Rembrandt said nothing. Just watched.
