Wednesday, October 8, 2008

Cesc and van Gogh

"Right now I'm fine with Arsenal, but I cannot deny that to return and play for Barca would be a dream come true for me. I chose to stay at the club last summer and right now I'm totally focused on the reason for that decision which was to try and win trophies. We'll see how things have gone by the end of the season."

- Cesc Fabregas, probably as disillusioned as the rest of us

I went to the van Gogh museum today. 

There are approximately 170 van Gogh paintings at the museum, arranged in chronological order. It's neat how you can walk across the floor and see how Vincent developed as an artist and how his style of painting changed as he grew older and sadder. 

There's this one spot in the gallery where you're looking at Wheatfield With Crows, with its gloriously golden wheatfield below a dark, foreboding sky. Three pathways meander through the field, going nowhere. It was painted shortly before his death, and it really does reflect a troubled mind. It's claustrophobic and disturbing, and there's this sense that there's no way out. 

And yet, if you turn around, in the opposing corner of the gallery, you can see his Paris paintings, where everything is brightness and lightness. You can feel the optimism from those paintings, the sense that the world was just beginning to open up for him and that everything was going to be peachy. 

I found that incredibly poignant. You're only young once, and there's only one time in your life when the world opens up and reveals itself to you in all its glory. If you miss it, you can go looking for it, but it'll be meaningless, a chasing after of the wind. It'll always be just over your shoulder, on the other side of the gallery. 

There is a rather tenuous Arsenal link to this...

It ties in with Cesc because I seriously think he should consider leaving at the end of the season. This is on proviso that we don't win anything, and we don't look like we're taking steps to rectify the situation. Cesc is too good to play for a side that can't (or won't) challenge for major trophies. He's got so much talent, but this time will only come once in his life. He should be making the most of it. 

Cesc should be at a club that wins things. 

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Obvious Amsterdam has brought out the thinker in you.

Hope things are OK and your cold is getting better.

Darren

WEG said...

No, it's just the free wifi in the central library makes posting a bit more leisurely, less pushed. You should see this place, though - it's perched on a pier in the middle of a bay, and there are panoramic views over the city. I'm probably spending a bit too much time in here.

Things are fine. Bit at a loss about where to go, but I'll probably just do a bus tour around Germany or something. Kind of sick of organising stuff, and need a break from it.

DogFace said...

Football is more than winning cups... it's about being part of a team. That's more true today than in this ultra-cynical game that it ever was.

We all know that Fabregas will one day leave for Barca - but he will leave to play the best football he can rather than being 'too good' to play for a side that "can't challenge" - These days cups and titles are bought more than won you will find that anyone in the game will tell you that.

WEG said...

It's a bit of a circular argument, Dog, because the purpose of the team is to win things. The best football is winning football, and Cesc wants to win - with us if possible, but without us if not. And I don't doubt that cups and titles are bought nowadays.