The man with the hollow tooth or Dr Ma mit em hohle Zahn

Too much time has passed since I blogged here. Rather than a great catch up I shall just jump right in and pretend I never missed a day (let alone months):

I have been working in a journal in our Australian Art Journal Round Robin.

Nicole's journal is not really a journal but a gorgeous box that opens up in half much like a book. The theme is "Out of the box". This theme was so freeing and "out of the box" for me that it took me a while to find what I'd be doing as my entry. Normally when working to a theme I try to push the boundaries and think outside the box.

With the theme of "Out of the box" it was more the opposite for me: a working "into a box" if that makes any sense.

I based my entry on a story my Grandpa used to tell me when I was little. Here the original in Swissgerman:

Es isch emau e Ma gsy dä het e hohle Zahn gha,

im hohle Zahn isch es Chischtli gsy,

im Chischtli isch es Briefli gsy,

im Briefli isch gstande:

Es isch emau e Ma gsy dä het e hohle Zahn gha,

im hohle Zahn isch es Chischtli gsy,

im Chischtli isch es Briefli gsy,

im Briefli isch gstande:

It is one of those never ending  stories that loop. The sparse reference I could find on the net implied it was a Swiss story as it was apparently not known in Germany. The story goes like this (translated from Swissgerman:)

There once was a man who had a hollow tooth,

inside the tooth was a little box,

inside the little box was a letter,

inside the letter was written:

There once was a man who had a hollow tooth,

inside the tooth was a little box,

inside the little box was a letter,

inside the letter was written:

etc. etc.  you get the idea.

 

Somehow as a kid I could not get enough of this story and I must have driven my ever patient Grandpa nuts with urging him to go on and on and on.

In my mind I could see it clearly; the man with the hollow tooth who's tooth housed increasingly smaller versions of himself (like a Russian nesting doll) and at the same time I was still curious as to what the next "little box" might contain. But of course it always was another letter with the same story in the box but that did not dim my fascination with it.

It was a bit like holding both mirrored bathroom cabinet doors to my face as a child and seeing an infinite and ever smaller version of myself. Or like going for a walk not knowing what the next bend in the path might reveal. 

As an adult I ask myself who this man with the hollow tooth is: A trickster? A magician? A teacher of infinity for children? A side show freak displaying his hollow tooth for all to see or a holy man at peace with his disfigurement, using it as a teaching tool for others? Whatever he symbolises he has been able to mesmerise me and make me wonder.

 

My entry in Nicole's "journal" became itself a little box as this is a hollow double layer about 1cm thickness. Inside the hollow tooth sits a little box with a wee letter stuck in it and with a wee drop of sealing wax which landed partially on my finger. I have a blister to prove it. (Note to self: When working with sealing wax on tiny areas it is safer to use a toothpick or similar to hold down the piece.) I used a Pitt pen and water soluble pencils for the front and acrylic interference paint for the tooth.

On the back I wrote the story as many times as it would fit onto the paper and then used an aqua brush to paint a man's face with water and the soluble ink from my writing pen as the only paint.

I enjoyed working in this box of a journal and it brought back many memories from my childhood.

Until next time!