Look at this
painting of a
snowman doing
laundry. Naturally, the first thing which catches your eye about it is the fact that it is a snowman, doing laundry. Why would a snowman need to do laundry at all? They don’t wear
clothes. You don’t need clothes to stay warm when you’re made out of
snow. You don’t need clothes for
modesty when you have no
anatomy to keep covered, and in any event, the snowman in this painting is wearing nothing other than a
top hat, so it seems neither
cold nor modest.
The next thing you notice is the kind of laundry being done, all seemingly clothes for the
summer, which is even more incongruous. One
Hawaiian shirt. One
bikini top and bottom. One light, airy
skirt and one pair of
khaki pants, the kind cut off just below the knees. Beach clothes. But it is clearly
wintertime in the painting, snow on the ground, and even a flurry of snow falling down in the distant background of the blue-gray
sky. Is the snowman doing the laundry of the people who live in that little red
house seen a little bit off in the background to the left? Are they its makers? Or, is the snowman doing its own laundry in anticipation of a summer
trip? Is the snowman a
slave, or even possessed of
free will? From the painting, it is impossible to tell. The only thing apparent is that the snowman works with a
smile on his
face. But then, one does not know if it even has the ability to
frown, if it wished to.