Never-ending picture show

«Water plays tricks on whatever lies within its reach. It distorts and dismembers, then restores an extravagant wholeness, making two of one - which is exactly what the Indian artists of the Northwest were doing in their designs. Living on water, as aquatic in their habits as sea otters, the coastal tribes couldn't help but see in the water's playful games a true reflection of their own instinctive worldview. Rippled surfaces exoposed a restless and inconstant nature, in which things continually swapped places and suddenly, misterious transformations abounded. Carving a box or painting a muslin curtain, the artist was, in effect, recreating scenes from the water's never-ending picture show.»

Jonathan Raban, "Passage to Juneau", Picador, 2000 (a melhor coisa que me foi dado ler desde o terramoto de 1755).