Die Happy

A pattern is a picture of the essence of an object, an object’s very life; its beauty is of that life. In fact, it would be truer to say that its beauty is that life staring the pattern maker in the face. A pattern may lie on a table inert, just ink on paper, but it is the child of vision. Springing thus from life it must itself be alive or it is nothing. From the bamboo leaf to the pattern there is transformation, as from the chrysalis to butterfly, taking life with it into a new form. This metamorphosis is its significance. A good pattern is pregnant with beauty. The maker of a pattern draws the essence of the thing seen with his own heartbeat, life to life.

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