The Art Gallery Above Us

November Six Word Photo Story Challenge: “Happiness”

The sky is an art gallery.

Art elevates the soul, which is why art galleries are so important to a civilized society. But sometimes we cannot get to an art gallery.

The other day, it was raining furiously. The day was dark and gloomy. Going anywhere was out of the question, so I went online to look at some art. I went to the site of the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., a wonderful museum I have visited dozens of times and which always fills me with optimism.

I perused paintings for about an hour when I entered into the search box “cloudy.” I was curious what that search would find in the way of paintings. A dozen or so paintings came up, all showing clouds above towns, forests, or the sea.

I then went into the catalog of my photographs. As a mediocre amateur photographer, I have made dozens of photos of skies I found interesting. Some of them looked like impressionist paintings to me. I manipulated a few of them in Photoshop to create “something special,” but I prefer the “natural” ones.

Sadly, photographs of the sky are much less than a dime a dozen. Cloud pictures are underappreciated. That is unfortunate because they always make me happy, even photos of storm clouds. If more people took the time to look up at the sky, there would be more happiness in the world.

Happiness can take the form of a nice photograph of the sky.

© 2023 John Dean

Special thanks to Vidya Sury, Collecting Smiles, Mary Chang Story Teller, and the other gifted editors and writers contributing to Six Word Photo Story Challenge. They make Medium a nicer place to visit.