Speaking in Gaelic, Print-G. and Irish discuss the deplorable situation of the field of art history in the dark staff cafe at the Met. They ignore the mafioso mayhem occurring throughout the museum above and focus on things of transcendent importance.
"My agent is a bitch," says Irish in proverbial Gaelic.
"Have some whiskey," replies Print-G in the same tongue.
"Thanks, I have my own flask." Irish checks her purse. "Wait, no I don't."
Print-G. pours for her.
"You killed 'em tonight, Mac," says Irish.
"But I didn't kill him. I've never carried a ninja star in my life."
"No, I meant you gave a great paper," says Irish. Curiously, the idiomatic confusion has registered in Gaelic.
"Thanks," says Print-G. "Do you think we should phone the police?"
"Nah," says Irish. She sips her whiskey. "Best not to get involved in this Dan Brown stuff."
"Do you have the money you owe me for creaming you at darts last week?" asks Print-G.
"I hate you," says Irish. She reaches into her purse.
"I constantly think it's funny that you've been chosen to save the world. And yet you intend to do it with a book about Apocalypse imagery. Doesn't make any sense, Irish!"
Without elaborating any further for our readers, Irish shrugs.
Then she says, "Mac, my wallet's gone."
---
The word mayhem fails to explain the Met tonight, as it is now dotted throughout with mobsters, dealers, thieves, thugs, assassins, and Fulbright scholars, all of questionable motives. Upon witnessing an assassination, they scurry around for their lives in the dark. M. O. Manhattan leads Art Guy through the heart of the medieval material, which is interestingly the most thinly occupied of all the wings, and they finally arrive at the Lehman Collection.
"We should be safe here," says Manhattan. After collecting herself, she adds, "I can't believe they killed Don Fabio."
"Wait, I'm a little confused about that," says our hero. "Why is the position called 'don'?"
"Wow, you're just as cynical in real life as you are in your blog," says Manhattan.
"Sorry," says our hero. He strolls around and checks out some top-notch Simone Martinis. It takes a while for his eyes to adjust to the dark.
"Do you think he was assassinated by the Tiepolos or the Dandolos or something?" says Art Guy.
"Mhm," says Manhattan, not really paying attention to him. She opens the Simone-Lippo Memmi diptych she has acquired from the fiddler and begins to set it up on a white table.
"Wait, weren't we going to return that to Christie's and say that it was purchased with dirty money?" says Art Guy.
"Who's side are you on?" says Manhattan. "Christie's has become wholly and thoroughly corrupt; it might as well be a sister branch to the black market art dungeon in Chinatown. Museums are the only place to keep these items to ensure that the public will see them."
"I hear JSTOR is uploading Christie's exhibition catalogs," says Art Guy. (note: this is true.)
"Haven't you read Ways of Seeing? Or would you rather look at all your art through a computer screen?"
Our hero feels like he's not helping the future of public art very much at the moment, so he turns away and says, "Alright, I'm going to go find Gus."
"You're not going anywhere."
Art Guy turns toward Manhattan. She has drawn an antique Siberian sword. A grin creeps across her face. "We've got work to do."
---
Gus can't find his way out of the Egypt wing. He hides behind a stela while large groups of mobsters stalk by. Whether they are searching out other mobsters, or Gus himself, or avoiding assassins, or pursuing some other malicious cause, it is hard to say. After a while the confusion has left the Egypt wing. Gus hears a faint, "Help! Let me out of this thing!"
'This thing' happens to be an ancient sarcophagus.
Gus considers whether it is wise to touch the sarcophagus, even though there seems to be a living person inside.
"You better not be undead," says Gus. With all his might and with slight awkwardness he slides the slab off the top of the sarcophagus and lets it settle against a glass showcase filled with precious turqouise. He is surprised to see the cab driver from earlier in the day, Dr. Vengeance Vellum, lying in the sarcophagus with ropes around his hands and feet.
"Quick," says Vengeance. "There's a hit on tonight. The Dandolos have plotted to kill someone who's high up in the Ziani family. We have to escape."
"I think that's already happened," says Gus. "Fabio Ziani was a mafioso?"
"Yes. It is the Ziani family who plot to take over the Met. They've been doing this for years; it's how I lost my job. I was in with the Dandolos."
"Wow, so there are three families? What about the Tiepolos?"
"They're also being hunted tonight. Untie me; we're best getting out of this place, and I'll explain at the nearest Chipotle."
Gus says, "I think I should probably find Mr. Guy and make sure he's alright first. He invited me to this conference after all."
"Forget him, he's probably already dead."
Gus is torn.
---
Darkness D'Orsay knows the safest place for her. She makes for the emergency stairs and uses her ultra dark vision to gain an edge. She walks up to the second floor, sits down on a step, and considers how her talk went that night.
'I knew I'd be grilled, but I conveyed my main points clearly, illustrated theory with concrete evidence, not bad, not bad...' she ponders.
"Hey Darkness, is that you?" says a voice from the stair below. It is the voice of Loose Cannon L.T. -S. P. S.
Darkness starts to move quietly up the stairs.
"Come on. I know it's you, I tracked you to the emergency steps. Your scholarship is top-of-the-line. You're really a force in the field." Loose Cannon begins to move up the stairs.
"I don't know if I can trust you; you don't believe art belongs to the public," says Darkness.
Loose Cannon laughs. "That's right," she says. "It all belongs to me eventually. But let's not get broken up over a little scholarly discourse, why don't you join me for some tea and buscuits?"
With that Darkness starts running. Loose Cannon engages in the chase.
---
A. Girl Assassin perches on top of an aluminum helicopter in the Met's newest exhibition: "Jeff Koons installs helicopters on the roof!" (disclaimer: this is a fictional exhibition with fictional artwork.)
She spots Darkness D'Orsay emerge from a rooftop doorway and dash to another pop-art helicopter, in which she hides.
A. Girl waits to see who the pursuer is. Shortly, Loose Cannon steps onto the roof.
"I know you're here, scholar." She strolls around looking at the helicopters. She secretly wonders if any of the helicopters are flight-worthy and if she can perhaps wrangle up a few of the other Koons helicopters with a chord and fly them out of here.
"Believe me I just want to talk," she continues. "I said it once and I'll say it again."
She suddenly pulls out her engraved crossbow and points it at A. Girl Assassin.
"Make a move and it's your last," she says. "I spotted you the moment I got up here."
Darkness makes a dash for another rooftop door. For one second Loose Cannon's eyes dart in that direction. In that moment one of A. Girl's ninja stars disarms Cannon. The crossbow falls to the ground and lets off an arrow, and a Jeff Koons helicopter on the other side of the roof deflates with an awkward sound.
Loose Cannon turns back toward the assassin as Darkness disappears back into the museum.
"You'll pay for that," says Loose Cannon.
"No art thief escapes my wrath," says A. Girl, who then drops a smoke bomb and disappears.
Loose Cannon picks up her crossbow and continues her chase of the Impressionist expert.
---
Hates Italy Dude (his friends just call him, 'Dude,') has now become a Tiepolo, and his best friend, Victoria 2.0, demolitions expert (Vic for short) is a Dandolo. Vic waits in the Temple of Dendur for an opportune moment.
H. I. Dude moves swiftly past the Temple with what looks like an ancient book in his hand.
"Dude!" says Vic.
"Vic? Where are you?"
Vic emerges from the temple. "What do those Tiepolos have you doing?"
"Stealing the Jaharis Manuscript. I don't know why those guys took me, I don't have much of a criminal C.V. except for forging and market hustling."
"I couldn't really turn down my job with the Dandolos," says Vic. "I mean it's a bad recession and we are art history MA's."
"Oh come on, that's a cliche," says Dude. "We're all affected by the recession."
"I don't know what I was thinking buying that Dickensian London map," says Vic.
"And me with that worthless Limoges tea set. We'll be okay as long as we can still be friends," he says.
"Let's go for a walk; there's something I want to show you," she says.
As they move stealthily through the museum, seeing groups of mobsters moving around slickly, and one ganger hidden in a corner putting up a 'shh' finger to his lips, Dude asks Vic, "What do they have you doing? I bet they hired you for your demolitions expertise. Are you going to blow up the Temple of Dendur?"
She laughs. "Not tonight, I'm afraid."
They arrive at a room filled with the arts of Oceania. Vic sits down in a canoe.
"Well, are you going to get in, landlubber?" she says.
He sits in the canoe facing toward Vic.
"I was hoping we could say a prayer," says Vic.
"Nononono!" says Dude standing back up. "How long have you known me for Victoria?"
"Sit down, I just want to say one 'Hail Mary.' You just sit down and pretend you're fishing with your uncle or something."
"Okay," says Dude. "But this is a little weird."
"Hail Mary, full of grace-"
"Wait," Dude interrupts.
Vic looks up with a sorrow Dude has never seen before in her.
"My friend, I know my Coppola," says Dude. "This is blatantly a scene from 'Godfather, Pt. II.'"
"I'm sorry," says Vic.
"Why would you kill me in a canoe from Oceania?" he says.
"I thought the movie reference would make it easier."
"We could have been contenders, Vic."
"Shut up, let's get out of here and quit the mafia."
---
"I told you steps 1 and 2, didn't I, Art Guy?" says Manhattan, throwing him one of the two kerosene jugs she is holding. "1. Rewrite the public definition of art through subsidizing and controlling the galleries. 2. Discredit the field of art history and the importance of knowledge. Now here's step 3. make the public art of museums less and less accessible, and then you have a convenient recession and before you can say step 4., the Met burns down and there's no one to see it re-established."
"You're just going to burn the museum though and not the art?" says Art Guy.
"Precisely. The Ziani keep the artwork. They already have a right to it, if we have one of our guys reign as 'don' of the collection. As benefactors' rooms get combined into wings, which in turn get telescoped into the intellectual property of one great job title: the 'don of ancient, classical, medieval, early modern, modern, and contemporary arts at the Met,' it should only take some paperwork and hypnotism for the Ziani to acquire the entire collection from all the patrons. That will move us forward on the ultimate privatization of the world's artwork. Today the Met, tomorrow the world."
"What about the art of the streets?" says Art Guy.
"Step 1! Street art is not considered art anymore. No one will care about street art, and they'll eventually give up. Every work of 'art' proper will slowly belong to the private sphere," she says.
"That undermines what you said earlier today about you wanting art to be in the public sphere."
Manhattan cackles. "I'll never stop reading your blog, Art Guy. You're funny."
"Thanks, but you're not going to get away with this," says Art Guy.
"Who's going to stop me, Monet with his socially acute Waterlillies?" she says. She slices open the vaseline tank with her sword and lets it spill all over the floor of the Lehman collection.
"Are we planning to light this up tonight?" says Art Guy.
"I'll give it a week," she says. "You'll get barbecued tonight though, you already know too much."
Art Guy stares at his vaseline can wondering where things went wrong today.
He looks up.
"Oh my God, it's a bunny," he says.
A giant Jeff Koons bunny crashes to the floor of the Lehman Collection rotunda in a flurry of broken glass. Manhattan is trapped under its neck.
A. G. Assassin slides off the top of the bunny, and says to Art Guy, "There are thieves around. Where's the nearest curator?"
Manhattan slices her way out of the Koons aluminum bunny with her saber. Weapon drawn she says to the assassin, "You seek assistance?"
"I have a file on you, Manhattan," says the assassin. The ninja/sword fight that ensues is one of myths. It moves from the rotunda through the medieval section and eventually into the new Roman wing. Imagine really hard, like if a Mars statue was fighting an Athena statue or some such, only with Siberian sabers and ninja stars as well, that's the type of fight that goes on. Art Guy would recount it in detail, but as you can see it's been a long day. The next thing he remembers is that they are dodging around a rather erotic Hercules, the assassin licking her lips to distract Manhattan, when suddenly-
"Stop all the violence!" Loose Cannon pleas from a neoclassical catwalk. She points her crossbow at the fighters, and they stop. Art Guy tries to blend in with a line of heroes of the Republic.
"Give me the badge," says Loose Cannon, approaching M. O. Manhattan. Manhattan surrenders her curator badge.
"This isn't a hereditary art state - as a matter of fact it's all mine. I happen to have the Dandolo and Tiepolo at my fingertips. I know all about your ambitions and they are inspirational to say the least. But you've all lost. Museums have lost. Scholarship has lost, it's over now. The Met is being dissolved tonight I'm afraid."
But she has a moment of weakness as a ghostly violin melody sweeps through the museum.
---
Art Guy runs into Gus and Vengeance Vellum in the foyer as they too head for the exit.
"Gus! I've been trying to find you all day!"
"I'm sorry I was leaving, Mr. Guy! I thought you'd been killed."
"Wait up a second you two," says Vengeance. He runs up to the body of Fabio Ziani and snatches his 'don' badge.
"I'll change the title, but it's nice to have some security you know?"
As they prepare to exit, they hear the violin melody.
---
Vic and Guy are retreaving their original coats on the ground floor when the melody comes to them as well.
"Shall we check out the concert, Guy?" says Vic.
Guy says, "Yes, let's. But first let's play a game."
He pulls out two identical manuscripts. "Pick a Jaharis, any Jaharis."
Vic points to the one on the right.
"Good. That one's my forgery," says Guy. "We'll return it on our way back through the museum."
---
Darkness D'Orsay, who has hidden out in a staff computer lab and has been quietly revising her essay, clicks 'Save' and enters the museum to the sound of sweet violin.
---
"She stole my wallet," says Irish to Print G. as they enter the room that the music is coming from. Indeed the fiddler from 5th avenue stands in one corner with her instrument, next to a Hendrick Sorgh print, Man Playing a Violin. Everyone in the Met, except unfortunate Fabio Ziani, congregates in the room and forms a circle around her. Manhattan, Assassin, and Loose Cannon are the last to arrive. They stand mesmorized among each other.
"I don't care how good it is, I'm still getting my wallet back," whispers Irish.
As the violinist finishes she holds Irish's wallet up in the air.
No one moves forward.
"Call a spade a spade," says Irish. "That's my wallet." Irish approaches her, retrieves the wallet, and re-enters the circle.
The crowd is silent. The fiddler bows, and makes a quick exit stage left.
Then the audience bursts into applause.
"Gus," says Art Guy. "Let's get out of here and watch some Sister Wendy."
-------
by Joe Williams
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Encounters with Magnates, Pt. 4
(disclaimer: This episode borrows heavily from the films of Martin Scorcese.)
Vengeance Vellum, Ph.D. drives his taxi through Chinatown, wondering if the job he took is what he is. Look at it this way, he's been a taxi driver for three years, before that a manuscript specialist at the Met. That's what he is. And so too are the people he's seen on the way; they've become their jobs. The gangsters who talk about art like they're insiders, the hustlers, the thieves, the blockbuster curators, the ones who put up expensive retrospectives of their cousin's stuff. Dr. Vellum can't help but wish for a real rain to come along one of these days and wash the scum out of the museum business. Leave the art in the trusty hands of people who want to share objects, not covet them. Who want to inform the museum-goers, not alienate them. Ever since the Dandolos and the Tiepolos came through, he's been praying for rain.
He pulls over to the curb. "You talking to me," he starts, as points the rear view mirror toward himself. "There's no one else here. You talking to me?" But suddenly a guy with very large ears and wearing a long trench coat enters the backseat of Vellum's cab. Vellum recomposes himself.
"The Met," says the large-eared man.
Vellum can't help but think that he's seen this guy before in some of the manuscript material for his Ph.D. The ears are simply unbelievable.
"Stop in Little Italy," adds the passenger. "We're going to pick up a snack on the way. I hope you've got your afternoon free, Vellum."
Vellum looks in his rear view mirror and notices that the stranger is threatening him with a revolver. The lapel of a checkered suit shows just inside the trench coat.
---
Gus's fear gradually turns to boredom as the black market auction draws on and on. Every once in a while he wonders what happened to that sharp young man who bought the Limoges tea set, and his friend with the bright red coat who bought the Dickensian London map. But then comes another item, and another, and as Gus squirms in his seat, he wonders if he'll ever get a chance to take a bathroom break, let alone reconvene with Art Guy in time to get to the art show.
"And the next item," says Loose Cannon, "is Vermeer's The Concert. I don't know what Isabella was thinking hanging this in such a gloomy place. It's up to one of you now to rescue it."
A man dressed in a tuxedo in the front row lets out a chuckle.
"I'm sorry, did you want to have the first bid?" says Loose Cannon.
The gangster replies, "No, my apologies, it's just funny the way you put things."
"Funny?" says Loose Cannon. "That's interesting. I've never thought myself much the comedian. Funny in what way?"
He says, "It's not a big deal, I just thought the way you put it was funny."
"Okay. Funny how? Come on, funny how?"
The man chuckles again, this time a little more nervously.
"Funny like a clown? Like I'm here to amuse you? Out with it now, funny how?"
An intern says to Loose Cannon, "He didn't mean anything by-"
"He can speak for himself; he's a big boy," she interrupts, moving up to the front of the stage. She peers down at the gangster in the first row. "You think I'm funny, right? Don't leave me out of the joke. What's wrong with you? Are you going to speak? What are you, two? How am I funny - what's funny?"
The gangster sinks into his chair and despite the feeling of fifty eyes on him, lets an inexplicable smile catch his lips, a smile that has probably been transmitted by Loose Cannon's threatening grin.
Feeling like she's made her point, she steps to the back of the stage.
"You know what I think is funny?" she says.
The auction dungeon is silent.
"Watching you dance," she says. With that she pulls out a sixteenth-century engraved crossbow and begins loading and firing it at the gangster's feet. He jumps up out of his chair and skips around the arrows as they land in the dirt around him. The place is suddenly alive with laughter and applause.
Gus almost makes a break for the exit, but the tuxedoed man who brought him in puts a hand on his shoulder. "Stay until the end," he says. "Don't you want a ride to the Met for the exhibition opening tonight?"
---
Our hero feebly tries to talk his way out of going with the Met curator named M.O. Manhattan to defeat the mafia. But he can't seem to find footing in the conversation.
"The exhibition catalogs are taking over the scholarly world," says the curator. "That's step one. I call it the publicization of the private sphere." She's walking extremely fast, and our hero is tripping over the pavement as he tries to keep up.
"Look, I have to be at the Met by 8 PM," says Art Guy.
"Good, that's where I'm going too," says Manhattan. "Everyone is going to be there."
"What do you mean?"
"The Dandolo family, the Tiepolo family, everybody."
"But I thought it was a purely scholarly enterprise," Art Guy says.
"Exactly," says Manhattan. "They plan to take advantage of the recession and publically discredit the field of art history. That's step two. As the public becomes less informed about the importance of art in history, the objects look more and more like objects and not like useful markers of the past."
Art Guy wishes Gus could be hearing this. Then he remembers that he has lost Gus.
"I have to find my friend," says Art Guy.
"The only chance you have of seeing him is by attending the exhibition opening."
"What?"
"Surely he was snapped up by the Dandolo and Tiepolo families at the art auction. Come on, hurry up." Art Guy hustles across an intersection and for the third time that day almost gets flattened by Manhattan traffic.
"Wait," says Art Guy.
The curator stops in her tracks, visibly annoyed.
"Why do you need me?" says our hero.
"Because I read your blog, Art Guy in Jeans. I need you to speak out at the art opening today to credit the field of art history. If anyone in this world can do it, it's you."
Art Guy plays the reception of the compliment with remarkable smoothness.
"Thanks," he says.
"You're welcome, now let's go."
---
The large entrance hall of the Met is filled with elegant fold-out chairs. Art Guy sits down with Manhattan and opens the program. One talk is to be delivered from an Impressionist expert and one from Print-G. Mac. Then is an after-dark private reception for which every room of the museum is open. Our hero gazes around the room. The audience includes a very large selection of checkered suits and purpel-lapel tuxedos. He is surprised to see the young man who bid on the Limoges tea set sitting among the tuxedoed people and wearing dark glasses and a tuxedo. And upon further searching he sees his friend, the woman who bid on the Dickensian London map, wearing checkers and sitting with the checkered suits.
"Which ones are the Tiepolos, and which ones are the Dandolos?" says our hero as quietly as he can.
Manhattan says, "The Dandolos are wearing the suits, and the Tiepolos tuxes."
"Are there any other families I need to worry about?"
"Not that I know of."
Art Guy is excited to spot the Byzantine expert and new boss from the previous episode, Dr. Irish, in attendance. She sits toward the back. If only he could find Gus and get in another conversation with the Byzantinist, they might have a shot of getting out of this mess and starting a new project on the other side of the world. But then Art Guy notices someone he does not want to mess with sitting next to Irish. It's the fiddler from 5th avenue.
---
"My name is F. Ginevra," says the fiddler to Irish.
"F. B. Irish. Good to meet you. What's your field?"
"I love it all," says the fiddler.
---
A few more thugs come in from the back just barely on time. Art Guy notices that Gus is among them. It looks like the Tiepolo have scrounged together a poor fit of a tux and pants for him.
"That's my friend!" says Art Guy, ready to jump up.
"Wait for an opportune moment," says Manhattan.
"Good evening," says a speaker at one end of the rotunda. "You may know me; my name is Fabio Ziani, and I'll be the session chair tonight."
Art Guy laughs at yet another last name reminiscent of the Venetian magnates.
"Allow me to introduce Dr. Darkness D'Orsay," says Ziani.
"Thank you," says Dr. D'Orsay, taking the podium and immediately putting Impression: Sunrise on the screen.
"You've seen it before," says the presenter, with an Irish brogue. Irish beams from the back.
"But have you thought about it outside the elementary narrative of formal antithesis to the Salon?" D'Orsay continues. She picks up the microphone and paces up and down the stage.
"You there," she says, pointing to a checkered-suit Dandolo. "What do you think of it?"
He says, "I agree with you what you're about to say. The public doesn't know how to appreciate this work as anything beyond a pretty picture."
"That's NOT what I was going to say. Don't put words in my mouth." She paces up and down. "Let's see." She clicks to the next slide. It's Monet's Sunrise over the Houses of Parliament.
"Impressionist scholarship is reaching a crisis," she says. "Beyond the volumes published on Monet's formalism, scholars in related fields look down their noses at the artist and think he's only for museum-goers, not for the history of art." (Disclaimer: this is based on a real paper given at a conference in Paris not long ago, that my friend whose alias is Darkness D'Orsay, attended in December.)
She continues in majestic fashion to explain the lacuna in scholarship that takes impressionism seriously anymore. She concludes by saying, "The public and the private collections that these paintings occupy display them with intentions as divided as the light in Monet's brushstrokes. But hopefully if we step back we can see the picture and attempt to enlighten its viewers."
Immediately the hands go up.
"That's all very poetic," says Loose Cannon L.T. - S.P.S from the back. "I respect your work finding a social history of art for these paintings. But don't you think this lacuna, this gap in the public's understanding of the work, should be embraced for the sake of profit, rather than corrected?"
"I agree," says a Tiepolo. "The more the scholars 'enlighten' the world, the more the public gives into their murky preconceptions that the art belongs to them."
"Here, here," says a Dandolo.
"Well don't just sit there," says Manhattan to Art Guy, "Now's where you say something."
Irish is called upon from the back. "To be honest, I can't believe where this conversation is going," she says. "Scholars need jobs. The field needs support. The public has every right to these paintings, and every right to know something about them besides the obvious. I am an art historian myself, and if anyone has any problem with this fine lady from Dublin and her ambitious project, they'll have to come through me."
Art Guy is then called upon.
He stands up and isn't sure how to follow Irish. "Yep, um, I can't really, I don't know how to follow that. I think the Waterlillies betray a very interesting social history."
Our hero sits down as the floor erupts again with questions and complaints.
"That was crap," Manhattan whispers to Art Guy.
He replies, "Frankly, I'm right with the Byzantinist. This is a ridiculous stream of questions and I don't want to take part in it. I'm going to get my friend Gus."
But then the lights dim to an intimate level and a spotlight shines on a discoball in the center of the Met's reception hall. Print G. Mac enters to a fanfare of "Blue Monday," and holds a Scottish print over her shoulder like a boom box. As she gets to the stage she says, "Have no fear, tonight's gonna be mental."
She then takes the crowd on a whirlwind tour through the story of the Scottish print. It starts in the eighteenth century and centers on genre and Roman village scenes. It's information overload for the Tiepolo and the Dandolo. Art Guy is mesmorized.
After an hour Ziani goes up on the stage and says, "That is very interesting. I'm afraid I have to take back the mic now."
"Stuff it Don Ziani," says Print G. "I'm only halfway through."
'Don' Ziani?, thinks Art Guy to himself.
"Okay!" says Ziani, snatching the mic. Print G. flips him off and walks off the stage. "What a lovely presentation, I'm glad so many famous people could come tonight. I am Fabio Ziani, and feel welcome to speak to me, your new don of Renaissance, Early Modern, and Modern departments at the Met. If not, I wish you all an enchanting night."
"That's a strange job title," says Art Guy to Manhattan.
Suddenly a female voice booms through the P.A. system.
"An enchanting night to you, don!"
A ninja star hits Ziani square in the chest. He collapses to the floor.
Silence siezes the crowd. They suddenly begin to scatter in all directions.
Gus hears something whiz by his ear. Another ninja star hits the Tiepolo bouncer next to him in the back of the neck. Gus has a moment of hesitation, but then makes a break for it. Not toward Art Guy, but off into the museum.
"Get him!" say the other Tiepolos.
And that's when the dim lights throughout the museum, as well as the spotlight that glares into the disco ball, suddenly go dark.
(to be continued...)
Vengeance Vellum, Ph.D. drives his taxi through Chinatown, wondering if the job he took is what he is. Look at it this way, he's been a taxi driver for three years, before that a manuscript specialist at the Met. That's what he is. And so too are the people he's seen on the way; they've become their jobs. The gangsters who talk about art like they're insiders, the hustlers, the thieves, the blockbuster curators, the ones who put up expensive retrospectives of their cousin's stuff. Dr. Vellum can't help but wish for a real rain to come along one of these days and wash the scum out of the museum business. Leave the art in the trusty hands of people who want to share objects, not covet them. Who want to inform the museum-goers, not alienate them. Ever since the Dandolos and the Tiepolos came through, he's been praying for rain.
He pulls over to the curb. "You talking to me," he starts, as points the rear view mirror toward himself. "There's no one else here. You talking to me?" But suddenly a guy with very large ears and wearing a long trench coat enters the backseat of Vellum's cab. Vellum recomposes himself.
"The Met," says the large-eared man.
Vellum can't help but think that he's seen this guy before in some of the manuscript material for his Ph.D. The ears are simply unbelievable.
"Stop in Little Italy," adds the passenger. "We're going to pick up a snack on the way. I hope you've got your afternoon free, Vellum."
Vellum looks in his rear view mirror and notices that the stranger is threatening him with a revolver. The lapel of a checkered suit shows just inside the trench coat.
---
Gus's fear gradually turns to boredom as the black market auction draws on and on. Every once in a while he wonders what happened to that sharp young man who bought the Limoges tea set, and his friend with the bright red coat who bought the Dickensian London map. But then comes another item, and another, and as Gus squirms in his seat, he wonders if he'll ever get a chance to take a bathroom break, let alone reconvene with Art Guy in time to get to the art show.
"And the next item," says Loose Cannon, "is Vermeer's The Concert. I don't know what Isabella was thinking hanging this in such a gloomy place. It's up to one of you now to rescue it."
A man dressed in a tuxedo in the front row lets out a chuckle.
"I'm sorry, did you want to have the first bid?" says Loose Cannon.
The gangster replies, "No, my apologies, it's just funny the way you put things."
"Funny?" says Loose Cannon. "That's interesting. I've never thought myself much the comedian. Funny in what way?"
He says, "It's not a big deal, I just thought the way you put it was funny."
"Okay. Funny how? Come on, funny how?"
The man chuckles again, this time a little more nervously.
"Funny like a clown? Like I'm here to amuse you? Out with it now, funny how?"
An intern says to Loose Cannon, "He didn't mean anything by-"
"He can speak for himself; he's a big boy," she interrupts, moving up to the front of the stage. She peers down at the gangster in the first row. "You think I'm funny, right? Don't leave me out of the joke. What's wrong with you? Are you going to speak? What are you, two? How am I funny - what's funny?"
The gangster sinks into his chair and despite the feeling of fifty eyes on him, lets an inexplicable smile catch his lips, a smile that has probably been transmitted by Loose Cannon's threatening grin.
Feeling like she's made her point, she steps to the back of the stage.
"You know what I think is funny?" she says.
The auction dungeon is silent.
"Watching you dance," she says. With that she pulls out a sixteenth-century engraved crossbow and begins loading and firing it at the gangster's feet. He jumps up out of his chair and skips around the arrows as they land in the dirt around him. The place is suddenly alive with laughter and applause.
Gus almost makes a break for the exit, but the tuxedoed man who brought him in puts a hand on his shoulder. "Stay until the end," he says. "Don't you want a ride to the Met for the exhibition opening tonight?"
---
Our hero feebly tries to talk his way out of going with the Met curator named M.O. Manhattan to defeat the mafia. But he can't seem to find footing in the conversation.
"The exhibition catalogs are taking over the scholarly world," says the curator. "That's step one. I call it the publicization of the private sphere." She's walking extremely fast, and our hero is tripping over the pavement as he tries to keep up.
"Look, I have to be at the Met by 8 PM," says Art Guy.
"Good, that's where I'm going too," says Manhattan. "Everyone is going to be there."
"What do you mean?"
"The Dandolo family, the Tiepolo family, everybody."
"But I thought it was a purely scholarly enterprise," Art Guy says.
"Exactly," says Manhattan. "They plan to take advantage of the recession and publically discredit the field of art history. That's step two. As the public becomes less informed about the importance of art in history, the objects look more and more like objects and not like useful markers of the past."
Art Guy wishes Gus could be hearing this. Then he remembers that he has lost Gus.
"I have to find my friend," says Art Guy.
"The only chance you have of seeing him is by attending the exhibition opening."
"What?"
"Surely he was snapped up by the Dandolo and Tiepolo families at the art auction. Come on, hurry up." Art Guy hustles across an intersection and for the third time that day almost gets flattened by Manhattan traffic.
"Wait," says Art Guy.
The curator stops in her tracks, visibly annoyed.
"Why do you need me?" says our hero.
"Because I read your blog, Art Guy in Jeans. I need you to speak out at the art opening today to credit the field of art history. If anyone in this world can do it, it's you."
Art Guy plays the reception of the compliment with remarkable smoothness.
"Thanks," he says.
"You're welcome, now let's go."
---
The large entrance hall of the Met is filled with elegant fold-out chairs. Art Guy sits down with Manhattan and opens the program. One talk is to be delivered from an Impressionist expert and one from Print-G. Mac. Then is an after-dark private reception for which every room of the museum is open. Our hero gazes around the room. The audience includes a very large selection of checkered suits and purpel-lapel tuxedos. He is surprised to see the young man who bid on the Limoges tea set sitting among the tuxedoed people and wearing dark glasses and a tuxedo. And upon further searching he sees his friend, the woman who bid on the Dickensian London map, wearing checkers and sitting with the checkered suits.
"Which ones are the Tiepolos, and which ones are the Dandolos?" says our hero as quietly as he can.
Manhattan says, "The Dandolos are wearing the suits, and the Tiepolos tuxes."
"Are there any other families I need to worry about?"
"Not that I know of."
Art Guy is excited to spot the Byzantine expert and new boss from the previous episode, Dr. Irish, in attendance. She sits toward the back. If only he could find Gus and get in another conversation with the Byzantinist, they might have a shot of getting out of this mess and starting a new project on the other side of the world. But then Art Guy notices someone he does not want to mess with sitting next to Irish. It's the fiddler from 5th avenue.
---
"My name is F. Ginevra," says the fiddler to Irish.
"F. B. Irish. Good to meet you. What's your field?"
"I love it all," says the fiddler.
---
A few more thugs come in from the back just barely on time. Art Guy notices that Gus is among them. It looks like the Tiepolo have scrounged together a poor fit of a tux and pants for him.
"That's my friend!" says Art Guy, ready to jump up.
"Wait for an opportune moment," says Manhattan.
"Good evening," says a speaker at one end of the rotunda. "You may know me; my name is Fabio Ziani, and I'll be the session chair tonight."
Art Guy laughs at yet another last name reminiscent of the Venetian magnates.
"Allow me to introduce Dr. Darkness D'Orsay," says Ziani.
"Thank you," says Dr. D'Orsay, taking the podium and immediately putting Impression: Sunrise on the screen.
"You've seen it before," says the presenter, with an Irish brogue. Irish beams from the back.
"But have you thought about it outside the elementary narrative of formal antithesis to the Salon?" D'Orsay continues. She picks up the microphone and paces up and down the stage.
"You there," she says, pointing to a checkered-suit Dandolo. "What do you think of it?"
He says, "I agree with you what you're about to say. The public doesn't know how to appreciate this work as anything beyond a pretty picture."
"That's NOT what I was going to say. Don't put words in my mouth." She paces up and down. "Let's see." She clicks to the next slide. It's Monet's Sunrise over the Houses of Parliament.
"Impressionist scholarship is reaching a crisis," she says. "Beyond the volumes published on Monet's formalism, scholars in related fields look down their noses at the artist and think he's only for museum-goers, not for the history of art." (Disclaimer: this is based on a real paper given at a conference in Paris not long ago, that my friend whose alias is Darkness D'Orsay, attended in December.)
She continues in majestic fashion to explain the lacuna in scholarship that takes impressionism seriously anymore. She concludes by saying, "The public and the private collections that these paintings occupy display them with intentions as divided as the light in Monet's brushstrokes. But hopefully if we step back we can see the picture and attempt to enlighten its viewers."
Immediately the hands go up.
"That's all very poetic," says Loose Cannon L.T. - S.P.S from the back. "I respect your work finding a social history of art for these paintings. But don't you think this lacuna, this gap in the public's understanding of the work, should be embraced for the sake of profit, rather than corrected?"
"I agree," says a Tiepolo. "The more the scholars 'enlighten' the world, the more the public gives into their murky preconceptions that the art belongs to them."
"Here, here," says a Dandolo.
"Well don't just sit there," says Manhattan to Art Guy, "Now's where you say something."
Irish is called upon from the back. "To be honest, I can't believe where this conversation is going," she says. "Scholars need jobs. The field needs support. The public has every right to these paintings, and every right to know something about them besides the obvious. I am an art historian myself, and if anyone has any problem with this fine lady from Dublin and her ambitious project, they'll have to come through me."
Art Guy is then called upon.
He stands up and isn't sure how to follow Irish. "Yep, um, I can't really, I don't know how to follow that. I think the Waterlillies betray a very interesting social history."
Our hero sits down as the floor erupts again with questions and complaints.
"That was crap," Manhattan whispers to Art Guy.
He replies, "Frankly, I'm right with the Byzantinist. This is a ridiculous stream of questions and I don't want to take part in it. I'm going to get my friend Gus."
But then the lights dim to an intimate level and a spotlight shines on a discoball in the center of the Met's reception hall. Print G. Mac enters to a fanfare of "Blue Monday," and holds a Scottish print over her shoulder like a boom box. As she gets to the stage she says, "Have no fear, tonight's gonna be mental."
She then takes the crowd on a whirlwind tour through the story of the Scottish print. It starts in the eighteenth century and centers on genre and Roman village scenes. It's information overload for the Tiepolo and the Dandolo. Art Guy is mesmorized.
After an hour Ziani goes up on the stage and says, "That is very interesting. I'm afraid I have to take back the mic now."
"Stuff it Don Ziani," says Print G. "I'm only halfway through."
'Don' Ziani?, thinks Art Guy to himself.
"Okay!" says Ziani, snatching the mic. Print G. flips him off and walks off the stage. "What a lovely presentation, I'm glad so many famous people could come tonight. I am Fabio Ziani, and feel welcome to speak to me, your new don of Renaissance, Early Modern, and Modern departments at the Met. If not, I wish you all an enchanting night."
"That's a strange job title," says Art Guy to Manhattan.
Suddenly a female voice booms through the P.A. system.
"An enchanting night to you, don!"
A ninja star hits Ziani square in the chest. He collapses to the floor.
Silence siezes the crowd. They suddenly begin to scatter in all directions.
Gus hears something whiz by his ear. Another ninja star hits the Tiepolo bouncer next to him in the back of the neck. Gus has a moment of hesitation, but then makes a break for it. Not toward Art Guy, but off into the museum.
"Get him!" say the other Tiepolos.
And that's when the dim lights throughout the museum, as well as the spotlight that glares into the disco ball, suddenly go dark.
(to be continued...)
Sunday, January 17, 2010
Encounters with Magnates, Pt. 3
A young woman who looks like Ginevra di Benci books it across Manhattan, through swerving traffic, carrying a violin case and a portable folding diptych containing 14th-century Sienese artwork. Close behind her is a slick Metropolitan museum curator, wearing a long, dark coat, elegant shoes, and a bandage around her right foot. Amazingly she speedwalks and manages an unnerving pace through the Manhattan crowds, closing in on the fiddler.
---
Gus and Art Guy stand at the curb outside Christie's, Gus hailing a cab and our hero on the phone trying to cancel his credit card.
"This is pretty hopeless," says Gus.
A cab arrives, and they both slide in the back.
"If I were trying to sell an expensive work of art on the black market where would I go?" says Art Guy to the cab driver.
"I know just the place," says the driver and guns it.
Without paying any attention to what the driver can hear, Gus says, "Are you trying to steal back the Simone Martini painting? This could get dicey, what with those mobsters and all."
"No Gus, I'm just trying to get my wallet back. And they weren't mobsters, don't be ridiculous."
"You'd be surprised," says the driver.
"Excuse me?" says Art Guy. "By the way, where are you taking us?"
"There's a joint in Chinatown where just the people you're talking about go to exchange artworks in the private domain. They set it up to take advantage of the recession. They're a bad bunch."
"How do you know this?" says Art Guy.
"I used to be in the museum business myself," says the driver, "but I left those jerks in the dust. They're too interested in objects, not in the social history of art. Not enough of the day to day, the stuff that brings home the bacon."
"Thank you," says Art Guy, now looking at Gus. "See here's a guy who's speaking my language."
The cab driver enters an intersection on a red and almost gets hit. He yells obcenities out the window.
"What was your field?" says Art Guy.
The driver says, "I studied the monstrous races in medieval Italian manuscripts. Trippy stuff, but at least I got a sense of social constructions in the period."
Gus says, "Why are you out of a job now?"
"Gus..." says Art Guy.
"It's okay," says the driver, pulling to a stop at a curb in Chinatown. "I messed up big time. I got involved with these dealers here, thugs, all of them. I think I'm free of them now. But by being linked to purchases of cheap manuscript leaves, I had to give up my museum job."
"See, Mr. Guy," says Gus. "It's a slippery slope. Keep your hands off that Simone Martini."
"He's right," says the driver, "and if you hear the names Tiepolo or Dandolo, get out of there."
"Is the gallery selling work by early Venetian patrons?" says Mr. Guy.
"No, those are the names of the mob families that hang out here. Just steer clear. I better get out of dodge myself."
Gus covers the bill, and the duo steps onto the curb by a phone booth. The cab driver speeds off.
"Where are we supposed to go?" says Gus.
Art Guy looks around but can't see signs of a gallery anywhere. They stand there feeling lost and out of place.
"Look at that," says Gus.
The violin player is spotted dashing along the nearby rooftops. She stops here and there to hide beneath the water towers.
"Let's make ourselves invisible," says Art Guy. They hide in an alley as if in an adolescent detective novel.
Shortly thereafter, the violin player climbs down a nearby drainage pipe and heads straight for the phone booth.
"This is our chance," says Art Guy. He has the conversation all planned out in his head: 'You stole my wallet,' 'No I didn't,' 'Yes you did, I saw you purchase a Simone Martini diptych with my money.' 'Alright, you got me, why don't you take the wallet and the diptych, and we'll call it even.'
"Wait," says Gus, holding our hero back. The Met curator appears around the corner and heads for the same phone booth as the fiddler. Meanwhile the fiddler speaks into the phone and hangs up, but she encounters the curator outside the booth. Art Guy and Gus watch and wait.
The curator speaks calmly to the fiddler. The fiddler offers her a wallet.
"That's my wallet!" says our hero, almost blowing his cover.
The curator tosses it aside, and it lands in the middle of the road. A few cards slip out and blow around in the breeze.
The curator suddenly puts a firm hand on the violin case. At this, the fiddler throws the Simone diptych about fifty feet in the air. The curator lets go of the case and dashes down the sidewalk to catch the diptych. Fortunately, she does. The fiddler hops onto the back of a metro bus, violin case in hand, and disappears in the space of fifteen seconds.
Art Guy rushes into the middle of the road defying death, collects his credit card, driver's license, insurance card, and wallet (all of which are in different places) and escapes onto the far curb. But he notices his long out-of-date student I.D. blowing around near the phone booth. Though years old, the card is essential for museum discounts.
The Met curator has taken notice of our hero and she picks up the I.D. card.
"Art Guy in Jeans, M.A. History of Art?" she says across the street. "Is this yours?"
Our hero waits for the crosswalk signal to claim back his I.D. card. He greets the curator, and says, "Thank you."
She looks him in the eyes. "What have you seen?"
"What do you mean?" he says.
Gus watches anxiously from the alley.
"Don't worry, I think I could use your help," she says. "What's your opinion of art in public and private hands?"
Art Guy says, "I'd be happy to see most art left in the public domain. But that's not to discount the importance of private patronage."
"I like your attitude," says the curator. "Call me Ms. Manhattan. M.O. Manhattan, specifically. I've worked in medieval, modern, and ancient. I try to stifle the mob's activities to snatch art from the public domain."
"Interesting," says Art Guy very coolly.
"This Simone Martini was destined for the black market. An outlet of the black market exists underground in that buffet house over there. What you have to do is ring a certain number in this phone booth and they open up the basement for you. Very dicey stuff. The powerful art magnates of New York, the Tiepolo and the Dandolo, live down there."
Art Guy suddenly realizes Gus has disappeared. His coolness slips for an invisible split-second.
"But the violin player paid for the painting fair and square," says Art Guy.
"It's probably dirty money, Mr. Guy," she says. "Otherwise she wouldn't know the number in the phone booth."
"Doesn't the mob have bigger fish to fry than auction house rejects?" says Art Guy.
"Hold your tounge, Simone Martini is one of the most prescient artists of his millenium."
"No, I agree, believe me, I agree," says our hero. "But why are they doing this through small bidding wars and not some larger scheme?"
"Mr. Guy, look around you."
He does and is not surprised to see that the block is decorated with a plethora of colorful images.
"We live in an age where art patrons don't know where to start. Art of the public domain has taken over. By patronizing private art in a small, yet public way, such as at an auction house here and there, perhaps they can redefine what 'art' is to people, and cause them to forget about their own public storehouse of images, cause them to them to believe that the only real art is that which is passed from one big hand to another."
"Were you eavesdropping on 5th avenue this morning?" says our hero.
---
Gus has slipped into the buffet to grab a couple of eggrolls, confident that they are just the thing to turn the day around. But he is greeted at the door by a man in a black tuxedo with purple trim.
"Thank you for calling in," he says. "The auction will begin in a couple minutes."
"Oh no, I was just hoping for..." but before Gus knows it he is literally being carried by the shoulders into the basement of the buffet.
Gus is surrounded by a treasure trove of a gallery. High-caliber Renoirs and Monets that he has never seen before line one corner of the room. In another corner stand shelf after shelf of manuscripts. Individual leaves and miniatures lie in piles around the books. In another corner is a shelf containing various cutlery, crockery, pepper grinders, and baking powder dispensers. The label on that shelf reads, 'STRA [...]' with the rest of the letters worn away by time.
The auctioneer wears a precious decorated sweater and carries a mug of tea as she steps onto the stage.
"Welcome to my gallery. You all know me, I'm sure, my name is Loose Cannon, L.T.-S.P.S. If you'd like to put in an order for some of my special holdings, you'll get a chance to do that at the end. Please feel free to hang up your coats in the room behind me."
Gus isn't sure whether it would be wise to hang his coat in the back room.
Loose Cannon says, "and our items for today, let's see. Oh my God, we have three Turner watercolors. How exciting. And the Tiepolo family presents for auction an authentic Limoges tea-set."
Gus gulps.
She continues, "And from the Dandolos in the back, oh hello, hello, move on in, don't be shy, sit on each others' laps if you must. From the Dandolos we have a wonderful map of Dickensian London. A hand to the Tiepolos and the Dandolos for their charity."
The tuxedos and the checkered suits applaud their approval while a bouncer shuts the door to the auction house with a faint thud.
(to be continued...)
---
Gus and Art Guy stand at the curb outside Christie's, Gus hailing a cab and our hero on the phone trying to cancel his credit card.
"This is pretty hopeless," says Gus.
A cab arrives, and they both slide in the back.
"If I were trying to sell an expensive work of art on the black market where would I go?" says Art Guy to the cab driver.
"I know just the place," says the driver and guns it.
Without paying any attention to what the driver can hear, Gus says, "Are you trying to steal back the Simone Martini painting? This could get dicey, what with those mobsters and all."
"No Gus, I'm just trying to get my wallet back. And they weren't mobsters, don't be ridiculous."
"You'd be surprised," says the driver.
"Excuse me?" says Art Guy. "By the way, where are you taking us?"
"There's a joint in Chinatown where just the people you're talking about go to exchange artworks in the private domain. They set it up to take advantage of the recession. They're a bad bunch."
"How do you know this?" says Art Guy.
"I used to be in the museum business myself," says the driver, "but I left those jerks in the dust. They're too interested in objects, not in the social history of art. Not enough of the day to day, the stuff that brings home the bacon."
"Thank you," says Art Guy, now looking at Gus. "See here's a guy who's speaking my language."
The cab driver enters an intersection on a red and almost gets hit. He yells obcenities out the window.
"What was your field?" says Art Guy.
The driver says, "I studied the monstrous races in medieval Italian manuscripts. Trippy stuff, but at least I got a sense of social constructions in the period."
Gus says, "Why are you out of a job now?"
"Gus..." says Art Guy.
"It's okay," says the driver, pulling to a stop at a curb in Chinatown. "I messed up big time. I got involved with these dealers here, thugs, all of them. I think I'm free of them now. But by being linked to purchases of cheap manuscript leaves, I had to give up my museum job."
"See, Mr. Guy," says Gus. "It's a slippery slope. Keep your hands off that Simone Martini."
"He's right," says the driver, "and if you hear the names Tiepolo or Dandolo, get out of there."
"Is the gallery selling work by early Venetian patrons?" says Mr. Guy.
"No, those are the names of the mob families that hang out here. Just steer clear. I better get out of dodge myself."
Gus covers the bill, and the duo steps onto the curb by a phone booth. The cab driver speeds off.
"Where are we supposed to go?" says Gus.
Art Guy looks around but can't see signs of a gallery anywhere. They stand there feeling lost and out of place.
"Look at that," says Gus.
The violin player is spotted dashing along the nearby rooftops. She stops here and there to hide beneath the water towers.
"Let's make ourselves invisible," says Art Guy. They hide in an alley as if in an adolescent detective novel.
Shortly thereafter, the violin player climbs down a nearby drainage pipe and heads straight for the phone booth.
"This is our chance," says Art Guy. He has the conversation all planned out in his head: 'You stole my wallet,' 'No I didn't,' 'Yes you did, I saw you purchase a Simone Martini diptych with my money.' 'Alright, you got me, why don't you take the wallet and the diptych, and we'll call it even.'
"Wait," says Gus, holding our hero back. The Met curator appears around the corner and heads for the same phone booth as the fiddler. Meanwhile the fiddler speaks into the phone and hangs up, but she encounters the curator outside the booth. Art Guy and Gus watch and wait.
The curator speaks calmly to the fiddler. The fiddler offers her a wallet.
"That's my wallet!" says our hero, almost blowing his cover.
The curator tosses it aside, and it lands in the middle of the road. A few cards slip out and blow around in the breeze.
The curator suddenly puts a firm hand on the violin case. At this, the fiddler throws the Simone diptych about fifty feet in the air. The curator lets go of the case and dashes down the sidewalk to catch the diptych. Fortunately, she does. The fiddler hops onto the back of a metro bus, violin case in hand, and disappears in the space of fifteen seconds.
Art Guy rushes into the middle of the road defying death, collects his credit card, driver's license, insurance card, and wallet (all of which are in different places) and escapes onto the far curb. But he notices his long out-of-date student I.D. blowing around near the phone booth. Though years old, the card is essential for museum discounts.
The Met curator has taken notice of our hero and she picks up the I.D. card.
"Art Guy in Jeans, M.A. History of Art?" she says across the street. "Is this yours?"
Our hero waits for the crosswalk signal to claim back his I.D. card. He greets the curator, and says, "Thank you."
She looks him in the eyes. "What have you seen?"
"What do you mean?" he says.
Gus watches anxiously from the alley.
"Don't worry, I think I could use your help," she says. "What's your opinion of art in public and private hands?"
Art Guy says, "I'd be happy to see most art left in the public domain. But that's not to discount the importance of private patronage."
"I like your attitude," says the curator. "Call me Ms. Manhattan. M.O. Manhattan, specifically. I've worked in medieval, modern, and ancient. I try to stifle the mob's activities to snatch art from the public domain."
"Interesting," says Art Guy very coolly.
"This Simone Martini was destined for the black market. An outlet of the black market exists underground in that buffet house over there. What you have to do is ring a certain number in this phone booth and they open up the basement for you. Very dicey stuff. The powerful art magnates of New York, the Tiepolo and the Dandolo, live down there."
Art Guy suddenly realizes Gus has disappeared. His coolness slips for an invisible split-second.
"But the violin player paid for the painting fair and square," says Art Guy.
"It's probably dirty money, Mr. Guy," she says. "Otherwise she wouldn't know the number in the phone booth."
"Doesn't the mob have bigger fish to fry than auction house rejects?" says Art Guy.
"Hold your tounge, Simone Martini is one of the most prescient artists of his millenium."
"No, I agree, believe me, I agree," says our hero. "But why are they doing this through small bidding wars and not some larger scheme?"
"Mr. Guy, look around you."
He does and is not surprised to see that the block is decorated with a plethora of colorful images.
"We live in an age where art patrons don't know where to start. Art of the public domain has taken over. By patronizing private art in a small, yet public way, such as at an auction house here and there, perhaps they can redefine what 'art' is to people, and cause them to forget about their own public storehouse of images, cause them to them to believe that the only real art is that which is passed from one big hand to another."
"Were you eavesdropping on 5th avenue this morning?" says our hero.
---
Gus has slipped into the buffet to grab a couple of eggrolls, confident that they are just the thing to turn the day around. But he is greeted at the door by a man in a black tuxedo with purple trim.
"Thank you for calling in," he says. "The auction will begin in a couple minutes."
"Oh no, I was just hoping for..." but before Gus knows it he is literally being carried by the shoulders into the basement of the buffet.
Gus is surrounded by a treasure trove of a gallery. High-caliber Renoirs and Monets that he has never seen before line one corner of the room. In another corner stand shelf after shelf of manuscripts. Individual leaves and miniatures lie in piles around the books. In another corner is a shelf containing various cutlery, crockery, pepper grinders, and baking powder dispensers. The label on that shelf reads, 'STRA [...]' with the rest of the letters worn away by time.
The auctioneer wears a precious decorated sweater and carries a mug of tea as she steps onto the stage.
"Welcome to my gallery. You all know me, I'm sure, my name is Loose Cannon, L.T.-S.P.S. If you'd like to put in an order for some of my special holdings, you'll get a chance to do that at the end. Please feel free to hang up your coats in the room behind me."
Gus isn't sure whether it would be wise to hang his coat in the back room.
Loose Cannon says, "and our items for today, let's see. Oh my God, we have three Turner watercolors. How exciting. And the Tiepolo family presents for auction an authentic Limoges tea-set."
Gus gulps.
She continues, "And from the Dandolos in the back, oh hello, hello, move on in, don't be shy, sit on each others' laps if you must. From the Dandolos we have a wonderful map of Dickensian London. A hand to the Tiepolos and the Dandolos for their charity."
The tuxedos and the checkered suits applaud their approval while a bouncer shuts the door to the auction house with a faint thud.
(to be continued...)
Friday, January 15, 2010
Encounters with Magnates, Pt. 2
Art Guy and Gus make their way down 5th avenue after Gus has talked our hero into going to a Christie's auction. It's not that Art Guy doesn't like auction houses, he loves them. They just take a lot out of him.
"Quit being a wimp," says Gus. "Don't you want to know the story of art today, rather than 800 years ago?"
"I want to be well rested for the print show opening tonight. Remember, our new boss is going to be there. And besides, there's more to 'art today' than the big stuff that gets exchanged for big cash from one big hand to another."
"Like street musicians?" Gus gestures toward a street fiddler. "Is that what you mean by art today?"
Finally in one of these conversations, our hero doesn't feel like the bad guy. "Gus, public art will be remembered. The decoration of our daily lives that's freely available, it's more prominent now than ever in human history. Don't you feel blessed to walk among the rich storehouse of the public domain, rather than surround yourself with a few coveted items like those fat cats do?"
"A lot of that art ends up in museums."
"They're just as bad," says Art Guy. It has the makings of a rant, so Gus cuts him off.
"Alright, sorry I brought it up. But Christie's is central to another aspect of art that you better learn quick, Mr. Guy. Art of the private domain. That's the art that ends up in textbooks."
"You've got a lot of spirit, partner," says Art Guy. "One second."
He runs over and drops his change in the fiddler's violin case.
"Some recession," says the fiddler as she eyes the change, causing Art Guy to look up.
"Mr. Guy, we'll miss our subway car," Gus says.
Our hero turns toward Gus, and then back toward the fiddler, and feels utterly defeated.
"Sorry," he says to the musician, and he throws a fiver into the case. He then catches up with Gus.
---
Auction houses are very complicated. So trust that the following account of an auction is in no way a representation of real life.
"Going once...going twice...sold to the man in the smoking jacket!" says the auctioneer before a Modigliani portrait. A man in a purple-trim tuxedo and dark glasses takes possession of the canvas and smiles for a line of paparazzi.
Art Guy watches as the Modigliani's new owner takes his seat among a crowd of other men in dark glasses wearing purple trim tuxedos.
"Look at the gangsters over there, Mr. Guy," Gus says overtly. As he says this, our hero wishes he could vanish into a painting of a Renoir party like the little girl does in that children's book about the National Gallery in London.
"The next item on our list...iiis...a Limoges enamel tea set! Do I hear 30,000? 30,000?"
Before the speedy-mouthed auctioneer can get to her third 30,000, a man dressed in a tan checkered suit, seated among a group of other men in tan checkered suits, puts up his number.
"30,000, do I hear 50?"
"Alright, I'm getting it," says a male voice from the back. Both the tuxedoed and checkered-suited groups turn toward him. Art Guy notices he is certainly not associated with a mob. He looks more like a recent student, wearing a blazer over a light pink shirt and dark sweater.
"Don't spend it on that, are you crazy?" says a woman in a bright red coat next to him, "We're going to wait for the map of Dickensian London. Do you forget that we're just out of grad school and there's a recession on?"
"It was your idea to come here," he retorts. "I'm going to enjoy myself if you'd let me." He raises his voice and directs it to the front. "I'll put 50 on the Limoges set."
"Do I hear 60?" says the auctioneer.
The tuxedo people put up their number.
"Do I hear 70?"
The checkered-suit people bid.
"Do I hear 80?"
"I can't pay that much," says the young man in the back.
"80,000 for an authentic limoges enamel tea set?" says the auctioneer. "Going once-"
Suddenly a woman near Art Guy and Gus, who wears a "Metropolitan Museum of Art" badge on the lapel of a long, black coat, raises her number.
"This is intense," whispers our hero to Gus.
"I told you it would be fun. This is what art is all about," says Gus.
"Do I hear 90?" says the auctioneer, raising her voice.
The checkered-suit people put up their number again.
"We have 90! Do I hear one hundred thousand?"
"Fine!" says the man in the back, raising his number.
"100,000, going once. Going twice!"
The men in the tuxedos and suits grumble.
"Sold to the man in the back."
"Yes!" says the young man.
"I'm still getting the Dickensian London map, jerk," says the woman in the red coat.
Throughout the afternoon a close pattern of bidding wars can be observed between the tuxedos, the checkered suits, and the Met representative. But when the the Dickensian London is presented, the woman in the red coat walks away victorious.
"Alright, can we go now, before they descend into the sub-Alpine primitives?" says the young man next to her.
"I like Italian paintings, but fine," she says. As they make their way out the door, Art Guy notices one tuxedo and one checkered suit follow them.
Indeed the next set includes some very low-priced late medieval Italian panel paintings.
"Because of the recession, this Simone Martini/Lippo Memmi collaborative Legend of the True Cross diptych is starting at 60 dollars," says the auctioneer.
No one makes a sound.
"60 dollars," the auctioneer repeats.
Art Guy realizes that he might have 60 dollars. He reaches for his number.
Gus says, "Don't you always say it's unwise to buy objects in your field?"
"Forget that," says Art Guy. "I'll donate it to my college museum or something."
"Even that's a slippery slope," says Gus.
"Shhhh."
Our hero reaches into his back pocket to check if he has sixty on him. His heart sinks.
"Gus, my wallet's gone."
"I have one for sixty!" says the auctioneer, gazing off into a distant corner of the room.
"Gus, what on earth happened to my wallet?" says Art Guy.
"Do I hear 100 dollars?" says the auctioneer. "Going once, going twice, and sold to the violin player!"
Art Guy looks up.
The fiddler player from 5th avenue walks up to the stage and claims her new Simone Martini. As she heads for the door, and the auction is adjourned, the Met representative stands up and makes a lightning-speed Manhattanite track toward her, disappearing into the crowd.
Art Guy stares off hopelessly.
"Mr. Guy, it looks like we're not well-dressed enough to chase people from Christie's," says Gus.
"I don't think we have much of a choice, Gus."
(to be continued...)
"Quit being a wimp," says Gus. "Don't you want to know the story of art today, rather than 800 years ago?"
"I want to be well rested for the print show opening tonight. Remember, our new boss is going to be there. And besides, there's more to 'art today' than the big stuff that gets exchanged for big cash from one big hand to another."
"Like street musicians?" Gus gestures toward a street fiddler. "Is that what you mean by art today?"
Finally in one of these conversations, our hero doesn't feel like the bad guy. "Gus, public art will be remembered. The decoration of our daily lives that's freely available, it's more prominent now than ever in human history. Don't you feel blessed to walk among the rich storehouse of the public domain, rather than surround yourself with a few coveted items like those fat cats do?"
"A lot of that art ends up in museums."
"They're just as bad," says Art Guy. It has the makings of a rant, so Gus cuts him off.
"Alright, sorry I brought it up. But Christie's is central to another aspect of art that you better learn quick, Mr. Guy. Art of the private domain. That's the art that ends up in textbooks."
"You've got a lot of spirit, partner," says Art Guy. "One second."
He runs over and drops his change in the fiddler's violin case.
"Some recession," says the fiddler as she eyes the change, causing Art Guy to look up.
"Mr. Guy, we'll miss our subway car," Gus says.
Our hero turns toward Gus, and then back toward the fiddler, and feels utterly defeated.
"Sorry," he says to the musician, and he throws a fiver into the case. He then catches up with Gus.
---
Auction houses are very complicated. So trust that the following account of an auction is in no way a representation of real life.
"Going once...going twice...sold to the man in the smoking jacket!" says the auctioneer before a Modigliani portrait. A man in a purple-trim tuxedo and dark glasses takes possession of the canvas and smiles for a line of paparazzi.
Art Guy watches as the Modigliani's new owner takes his seat among a crowd of other men in dark glasses wearing purple trim tuxedos.
"Look at the gangsters over there, Mr. Guy," Gus says overtly. As he says this, our hero wishes he could vanish into a painting of a Renoir party like the little girl does in that children's book about the National Gallery in London.
"The next item on our list...iiis...a Limoges enamel tea set! Do I hear 30,000? 30,000?"
Before the speedy-mouthed auctioneer can get to her third 30,000, a man dressed in a tan checkered suit, seated among a group of other men in tan checkered suits, puts up his number.
"30,000, do I hear 50?"
"Alright, I'm getting it," says a male voice from the back. Both the tuxedoed and checkered-suited groups turn toward him. Art Guy notices he is certainly not associated with a mob. He looks more like a recent student, wearing a blazer over a light pink shirt and dark sweater.
"Don't spend it on that, are you crazy?" says a woman in a bright red coat next to him, "We're going to wait for the map of Dickensian London. Do you forget that we're just out of grad school and there's a recession on?"
"It was your idea to come here," he retorts. "I'm going to enjoy myself if you'd let me." He raises his voice and directs it to the front. "I'll put 50 on the Limoges set."
"Do I hear 60?" says the auctioneer.
The tuxedo people put up their number.
"Do I hear 70?"
The checkered-suit people bid.
"Do I hear 80?"
"I can't pay that much," says the young man in the back.
"80,000 for an authentic limoges enamel tea set?" says the auctioneer. "Going once-"
Suddenly a woman near Art Guy and Gus, who wears a "Metropolitan Museum of Art" badge on the lapel of a long, black coat, raises her number.
"This is intense," whispers our hero to Gus.
"I told you it would be fun. This is what art is all about," says Gus.
"Do I hear 90?" says the auctioneer, raising her voice.
The checkered-suit people put up their number again.
"We have 90! Do I hear one hundred thousand?"
"Fine!" says the man in the back, raising his number.
"100,000, going once. Going twice!"
The men in the tuxedos and suits grumble.
"Sold to the man in the back."
"Yes!" says the young man.
"I'm still getting the Dickensian London map, jerk," says the woman in the red coat.
Throughout the afternoon a close pattern of bidding wars can be observed between the tuxedos, the checkered suits, and the Met representative. But when the the Dickensian London is presented, the woman in the red coat walks away victorious.
"Alright, can we go now, before they descend into the sub-Alpine primitives?" says the young man next to her.
"I like Italian paintings, but fine," she says. As they make their way out the door, Art Guy notices one tuxedo and one checkered suit follow them.
Indeed the next set includes some very low-priced late medieval Italian panel paintings.
"Because of the recession, this Simone Martini/Lippo Memmi collaborative Legend of the True Cross diptych is starting at 60 dollars," says the auctioneer.
No one makes a sound.
"60 dollars," the auctioneer repeats.
Art Guy realizes that he might have 60 dollars. He reaches for his number.
Gus says, "Don't you always say it's unwise to buy objects in your field?"
"Forget that," says Art Guy. "I'll donate it to my college museum or something."
"Even that's a slippery slope," says Gus.
"Shhhh."
Our hero reaches into his back pocket to check if he has sixty on him. His heart sinks.
"Gus, my wallet's gone."
"I have one for sixty!" says the auctioneer, gazing off into a distant corner of the room.
"Gus, what on earth happened to my wallet?" says Art Guy.
"Do I hear 100 dollars?" says the auctioneer. "Going once, going twice, and sold to the violin player!"
Art Guy looks up.
The fiddler player from 5th avenue walks up to the stage and claims her new Simone Martini. As she heads for the door, and the auction is adjourned, the Met representative stands up and makes a lightning-speed Manhattanite track toward her, disappearing into the crowd.
Art Guy stares off hopelessly.
"Mr. Guy, it looks like we're not well-dressed enough to chase people from Christie's," says Gus.
"I don't think we have much of a choice, Gus."
(to be continued...)
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Encounters with Magnates, Pt. 1
A burglar reaches the top of the Guggenheim spiral and grabs a rare Georgia O'Keeffe sculpture from a pedestal, not believing how easy it was.
The sculpture is abstract and sensual, and is called "New York, Sculpture 8." (disclaimer: it's a fictional work of art.)
The burglar knows there's no way out but down, or he'll set off the alarms. Yet he had broken the front door window with a rock, and not one bell had sounded. "Gotta love this recession," he says in his head. By the way, our author will continue to use the recession to excuse illogical events and aid the plot-line.
The burglar starts down the stairs but hears a clicking of heels.
He retreats back to the top of the spiral, but the clicking keeps coming. Eventually, a dark figure emerges from around the bend in the ramp. The burglar rushes to the rail and holds the sculpture over the edge. "I'll drop it," he says.
"You'd better not," says the stranger. Her voice is calm.
The burglar notices a the shape of a bow in the stranger's hair, and he begins to sweat; Father Tiepolo had warned him of this.
"Do you know that I'm an art burglar assassin?" says the stranger.
"Yeah," says the burglar. "I know."
After a pause he adds, "I don't really have a chance, do I?"
The stranger says, "Put the Georgia O'Keeffe back on the pedestal."
He says, "It's not right for the public eye."
She replies, "Is that your excuse for stealing it, or do you actually believe that?"
He steps forward with the Georgia O'Keeffe and places it on the pedestal.
"I like it, alright, I really like it," says the burglar. "It's a beautiful work of art. I wanted to take it for myself."
"I'm glad you said that," says the stranger. "What do you like so much about it?"
"I mean, it's Georgia O'Keeffe, what can I say?" he says.
"Distinctions all around," she says. "Come on, you'll have to do better than that."
She steps toward him. She is decked out in ninja gear except for the bow in her hair.
"In subject-matter it recalls her erotic floral paintings," says the burglar. "But it also prefigures her partnership with Stieglitz."
The assassin steps closer. "Oops," she says.
The burglar says, "What did I get wrong?"
"So you don't think it would be useful to leave an educational retrospective of Georgia O'Keeffe intact? Maybe you should take a look at it first, and you won't get your dates crossed. I think I prefer my erotic art in the public domain, sir."
---
In the morning, the ground floor of the Guggenheim is surrounded by caution tape and a hundred tourists moan outside the doors about how much time off work they each had to take to come to the museum.
"Gus," says Art Guy. "How badly do you want to see this exhibition? There are some nice O'Keeffes in the MoMA and at the Brooklyn Museum."
"What about Christie's?" says Gus.
"What about Christie's."
(to be continued...)
The sculpture is abstract and sensual, and is called "New York, Sculpture 8." (disclaimer: it's a fictional work of art.)
The burglar knows there's no way out but down, or he'll set off the alarms. Yet he had broken the front door window with a rock, and not one bell had sounded. "Gotta love this recession," he says in his head. By the way, our author will continue to use the recession to excuse illogical events and aid the plot-line.
The burglar starts down the stairs but hears a clicking of heels.
He retreats back to the top of the spiral, but the clicking keeps coming. Eventually, a dark figure emerges from around the bend in the ramp. The burglar rushes to the rail and holds the sculpture over the edge. "I'll drop it," he says.
"You'd better not," says the stranger. Her voice is calm.
The burglar notices a the shape of a bow in the stranger's hair, and he begins to sweat; Father Tiepolo had warned him of this.
"Do you know that I'm an art burglar assassin?" says the stranger.
"Yeah," says the burglar. "I know."
After a pause he adds, "I don't really have a chance, do I?"
The stranger says, "Put the Georgia O'Keeffe back on the pedestal."
He says, "It's not right for the public eye."
She replies, "Is that your excuse for stealing it, or do you actually believe that?"
He steps forward with the Georgia O'Keeffe and places it on the pedestal.
"I like it, alright, I really like it," says the burglar. "It's a beautiful work of art. I wanted to take it for myself."
"I'm glad you said that," says the stranger. "What do you like so much about it?"
"I mean, it's Georgia O'Keeffe, what can I say?" he says.
"Distinctions all around," she says. "Come on, you'll have to do better than that."
She steps toward him. She is decked out in ninja gear except for the bow in her hair.
"In subject-matter it recalls her erotic floral paintings," says the burglar. "But it also prefigures her partnership with Stieglitz."
The assassin steps closer. "Oops," she says.
The burglar says, "What did I get wrong?"
"So you don't think it would be useful to leave an educational retrospective of Georgia O'Keeffe intact? Maybe you should take a look at it first, and you won't get your dates crossed. I think I prefer my erotic art in the public domain, sir."
---
In the morning, the ground floor of the Guggenheim is surrounded by caution tape and a hundred tourists moan outside the doors about how much time off work they each had to take to come to the museum.
"Gus," says Art Guy. "How badly do you want to see this exhibition? There are some nice O'Keeffes in the MoMA and at the Brooklyn Museum."
"What about Christie's?" says Gus.
"What about Christie's."
(to be continued...)
Monday, January 11, 2010
A Lucid Description, Pt. 3
"I gather you just want the money for yourself," says Art Guy to Gus. It's the most heated argument they've had so far in their brief partnership.
"I'm not buying that, Mr. Guy," says Gus. "The only way either of us will get any of the money is if we provide the Byzantinist with a clear description of the wall-paintings without any theoretical embellishments."
"And I'm trying to describe why Peter is being ushered from the elect into the damned."
They are no longer in a Cyprian cave, but rather in a Ryanair terminal.
"All flights to Cairo are canceled," says the loudspeaker most suddenly. "Sorry."
"Well that's great," says Gus.
"Don't lose your bronze horses, Constantinople," says Art Guy.
"If that was an art joke, go get ushered into the damned," says Gus.
---
Three days later our hero and Gus have reached a compromise about what kind of description to give to Foxy Byzwiz Irish; they wait for her in the medievalist dry bar of Cairo.
In an exchange meant for our author's clarification of plot rather than for the sake of realism, Art Guy says to Gus, "Remember what to say?"
"Yeah," says Gus.
A clamor ensues outside that consists of an automobile crash, a market stall collapse, several shouts, a couple gunshots, and a commotion by chickens.
Suddenly the swinging doors unfold as the wool burqa'd Byzantinist whose last name is suitably "Irish" enters the building.
"Sorry I'm f--ing late," she apologizes.
She sits at the bar and orders the dryest water available.
"What have you got for me?" she says.
Art Guy hands Irish a portfolio filled with the images from Gus's camera. She flips through them.
"This is the wrong site," she says.
The ensuing silence is scarring for our hero to recall even today.
"I'm joking," she says a few seconds later.
Gus laughs pallidly.
She looks through the photos and is pleased.
"Good job Gus," she says. "Thanks for refraining from using flash."
"Thanks," says Gus. He hides his index finger which he cut open on one of the stalagmites.
"Now where's my description?" she says.
"Well, we thought it was best described in person," says Art Guy.
"You don't have a written description for me?" she says. "Any internet nerd could have taken pictures of that cave with their phone."
"Hear us out," says Art Guy. "Flip to the general view of the Last Judgment."
She does. She immediately says, "Why is Peter not among the apostles, and why is he being ushered into the damned?"
"I'm glad you asked," says Art Guy.
"I was asking myself. You two can have the money, thanks for the photos."
"You don't want to hear our explanation for Peter?"
"I'd rather read it."
"It's more than a description," says Gus. Our hero winks at Gus.
"Gus, I told you to keep that part a secret."
"Sorry Mr. Guy, I forgot; 'keep the iconography to ourselves until ready to publish'."
When they turn around they realize that Irish is almost out the door and not paying attention to their vignette.
"Wait," says Art Guy. "Do you have just two minutes to hear what we found? I think you could use it."
She turns back around. "Sell it to me with two words."
"Denialist cult."
"What?"
"The cult of denialists. A specifically Cyprian cult."
She hesitates and then sits back down at the bar.
"The story of this image centers around the Cyprian cult called the denialists," says our hero. "They denied their Christianity in the face of a general inquisition. Their patron saint was Peter. Their ultimate pilgrimage was to go to the Holy See and deny that Peter is buried there. In fact they believed they had the real relics of Peter at home in Cyprus."
"What evidence do you have for the cult of denialists?" says Irish.
"What evidence don't you have?" says Gus to Irish. Irish indicates the presence of a crowbar under her burqa.
"Archivio di Stato Cyprus. Confraternita - MS 5492 fol. 74 ff has everything you need to know," says Art Guy.
Irish's gaze loosens. "Go on," she says, betraying the beginnings of a smile.
"Well to combat the secret cult, I assert that the governers of Cyprus sought to demonize the denialists by describing their relics as those of an imposter Peter. In fact, they equated him with Judas, a betrayer. They went so far, in some contemporary manuscripts, to liken denying Peter to Judas. See this folio." Our hero points to a photo of a folio that he has pulled from his back pocket. "Peter's robes and stance conform to those typical of Judas in the Betrayal. In effect, Judas was shown by the Cyprian governers as a master of disguise," says Art Guy.
Gus adds, "A maestro di dissimulare, if you will."
"I won't," says Irish. She's fully smiling now.
"So they painted this image with imposter Peter (Judas), whom they thought the Cyprian cult was actually worshipping, depicted as one of the damned." says Art Guy.
"So why does the real Peter not appear in the order of apostles?"
"Because you have to consider how the image functioned," says Gus.
"Thank you Gus," says Art Guy. "Yes. Perhaps an effigy of the real Peter was put into place among the order of apostles."
"No," says Irish.
"Look at the wear on the stalagtites in this significant blank patch of wallspace. An effigy could have been hoisted up here during one of the processions."
"And the fake Petrine body owned by the denialist cult was likely hung upside down by his genitals," says Gus.
"Yes. Thanks Gus," says Art Guy.
Irish begins to laugh. "How, pray tell, did the denialists explain the translation of Peter's body to Cyprus?" she says.
"Seahorses," says our hero.
"Okay, you've earned your quota; don't walk away from here with book offers of your own," says Irish.
Gus draws Irish's attention to a detail of the hell side of the Last Judgment. Seahorses are intermingled with body parts.
"The various body parts were carried over water by horses of the sea, according to the legend. It wasn't the seahorses who willed to carry the relics, though. The relics themselves were piloting themselves toward their desired resting place. The miracle is similar to that described for the arrival of St. Mark's remains in Venice. "
"Except for the seahorses bit," says Irish.
"So you're on the side of the Cyprian governers?" says our hero.
"In not believing that seahorses carried Peter to Cyprus?"
"Exactly. The governers believed the seahorses had carried Imposter Peter to Cyprus."
"Right. Important distinction," says Irish.
---
After several more waters and a good deal of laughter, the terrible trio have discussed the images and are all still scratching their heads over the strange treatment of Peter. Eventually they exchange the money and contact info.
"You guys are really sleuths," says Irish. "Let me know if you need more assignments from afar. I'll be in New York a good bit. A friend of mine is taking the history of print culture by storm with a show there."
"Will do. Are you ready to publish on that material?" says Art Guy.
"We'll see. For now, I'm just glad you two turned out alright," she says. "Good job avoiding my traps."
With that she exits the bar.
Art Guy and Gus look at each other.
Cyril Mango walks in a few minutes later. "I'd like some stiff water," he says across the bar. "And a new market stall if you've got any."
The bartender expresses confusion.
"Just joking, stiff water will be fine."
(written by Joe Williams.)
"I'm not buying that, Mr. Guy," says Gus. "The only way either of us will get any of the money is if we provide the Byzantinist with a clear description of the wall-paintings without any theoretical embellishments."
"And I'm trying to describe why Peter is being ushered from the elect into the damned."
They are no longer in a Cyprian cave, but rather in a Ryanair terminal.
"All flights to Cairo are canceled," says the loudspeaker most suddenly. "Sorry."
"Well that's great," says Gus.
"Don't lose your bronze horses, Constantinople," says Art Guy.
"If that was an art joke, go get ushered into the damned," says Gus.
---
Three days later our hero and Gus have reached a compromise about what kind of description to give to Foxy Byzwiz Irish; they wait for her in the medievalist dry bar of Cairo.
In an exchange meant for our author's clarification of plot rather than for the sake of realism, Art Guy says to Gus, "Remember what to say?"
"Yeah," says Gus.
A clamor ensues outside that consists of an automobile crash, a market stall collapse, several shouts, a couple gunshots, and a commotion by chickens.
Suddenly the swinging doors unfold as the wool burqa'd Byzantinist whose last name is suitably "Irish" enters the building.
"Sorry I'm f--ing late," she apologizes.
She sits at the bar and orders the dryest water available.
"What have you got for me?" she says.
Art Guy hands Irish a portfolio filled with the images from Gus's camera. She flips through them.
"This is the wrong site," she says.
The ensuing silence is scarring for our hero to recall even today.
"I'm joking," she says a few seconds later.
Gus laughs pallidly.
She looks through the photos and is pleased.
"Good job Gus," she says. "Thanks for refraining from using flash."
"Thanks," says Gus. He hides his index finger which he cut open on one of the stalagmites.
"Now where's my description?" she says.
"Well, we thought it was best described in person," says Art Guy.
"You don't have a written description for me?" she says. "Any internet nerd could have taken pictures of that cave with their phone."
"Hear us out," says Art Guy. "Flip to the general view of the Last Judgment."
She does. She immediately says, "Why is Peter not among the apostles, and why is he being ushered into the damned?"
"I'm glad you asked," says Art Guy.
"I was asking myself. You two can have the money, thanks for the photos."
"You don't want to hear our explanation for Peter?"
"I'd rather read it."
"It's more than a description," says Gus. Our hero winks at Gus.
"Gus, I told you to keep that part a secret."
"Sorry Mr. Guy, I forgot; 'keep the iconography to ourselves until ready to publish'."
When they turn around they realize that Irish is almost out the door and not paying attention to their vignette.
"Wait," says Art Guy. "Do you have just two minutes to hear what we found? I think you could use it."
She turns back around. "Sell it to me with two words."
"Denialist cult."
"What?"
"The cult of denialists. A specifically Cyprian cult."
She hesitates and then sits back down at the bar.
"The story of this image centers around the Cyprian cult called the denialists," says our hero. "They denied their Christianity in the face of a general inquisition. Their patron saint was Peter. Their ultimate pilgrimage was to go to the Holy See and deny that Peter is buried there. In fact they believed they had the real relics of Peter at home in Cyprus."
"What evidence do you have for the cult of denialists?" says Irish.
"What evidence don't you have?" says Gus to Irish. Irish indicates the presence of a crowbar under her burqa.
"Archivio di Stato Cyprus. Confraternita - MS 5492 fol. 74 ff has everything you need to know," says Art Guy.
Irish's gaze loosens. "Go on," she says, betraying the beginnings of a smile.
"Well to combat the secret cult, I assert that the governers of Cyprus sought to demonize the denialists by describing their relics as those of an imposter Peter. In fact, they equated him with Judas, a betrayer. They went so far, in some contemporary manuscripts, to liken denying Peter to Judas. See this folio." Our hero points to a photo of a folio that he has pulled from his back pocket. "Peter's robes and stance conform to those typical of Judas in the Betrayal. In effect, Judas was shown by the Cyprian governers as a master of disguise," says Art Guy.
Gus adds, "A maestro di dissimulare, if you will."
"I won't," says Irish. She's fully smiling now.
"So they painted this image with imposter Peter (Judas), whom they thought the Cyprian cult was actually worshipping, depicted as one of the damned." says Art Guy.
"So why does the real Peter not appear in the order of apostles?"
"Because you have to consider how the image functioned," says Gus.
"Thank you Gus," says Art Guy. "Yes. Perhaps an effigy of the real Peter was put into place among the order of apostles."
"No," says Irish.
"Look at the wear on the stalagtites in this significant blank patch of wallspace. An effigy could have been hoisted up here during one of the processions."
"And the fake Petrine body owned by the denialist cult was likely hung upside down by his genitals," says Gus.
"Yes. Thanks Gus," says Art Guy.
Irish begins to laugh. "How, pray tell, did the denialists explain the translation of Peter's body to Cyprus?" she says.
"Seahorses," says our hero.
"Okay, you've earned your quota; don't walk away from here with book offers of your own," says Irish.
Gus draws Irish's attention to a detail of the hell side of the Last Judgment. Seahorses are intermingled with body parts.
"The various body parts were carried over water by horses of the sea, according to the legend. It wasn't the seahorses who willed to carry the relics, though. The relics themselves were piloting themselves toward their desired resting place. The miracle is similar to that described for the arrival of St. Mark's remains in Venice. "
"Except for the seahorses bit," says Irish.
"So you're on the side of the Cyprian governers?" says our hero.
"In not believing that seahorses carried Peter to Cyprus?"
"Exactly. The governers believed the seahorses had carried Imposter Peter to Cyprus."
"Right. Important distinction," says Irish.
---
After several more waters and a good deal of laughter, the terrible trio have discussed the images and are all still scratching their heads over the strange treatment of Peter. Eventually they exchange the money and contact info.
"You guys are really sleuths," says Irish. "Let me know if you need more assignments from afar. I'll be in New York a good bit. A friend of mine is taking the history of print culture by storm with a show there."
"Will do. Are you ready to publish on that material?" says Art Guy.
"We'll see. For now, I'm just glad you two turned out alright," she says. "Good job avoiding my traps."
With that she exits the bar.
Art Guy and Gus look at each other.
Cyril Mango walks in a few minutes later. "I'd like some stiff water," he says across the bar. "And a new market stall if you've got any."
The bartender expresses confusion.
"Just joking, stiff water will be fine."
(written by Joe Williams.)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)