Read Online Innocent Monster by Reed Farrel Coleman - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Reed Farrel Coleman
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Moe or Mr. Prager, if that is more comfortable for you. Second thing is that although the case is over three weeks old, I’m new to it and playing catch-up. The police do things their way and I do things my way. Why I’m here is to try and get some understanding of why Sashi’s work and Sashi herself seem to make people like yourself, serious people involved in the art world, so incensed and crazed.”
“That, Mr. Prager, is a very easy question to answer. Art, in this case, painting, is more, much more than what appears on the canvas. Art is also what goes on in the artist’s mind before and during and after putting brush to canvas. Art is a continuum that stretches from conception to reaction and beyond.”
“Okay, let’s say I buy that. On the other hand, I’ve seen a lot of Sashi’s work,” I said, “and I know this is going to upset you, but it’s pretty good. I’m no art critic and certainly not the curator of a museum, but I know a little bit about art. Her work is undeniably reminiscent of Kandinsky and Pollock.”
Rusk clapped his hands together and laughed. “Ah, Mr. Prager, for an artist to produce work that is reminiscent of her forebears, mustn’t she be aware of those forebears? Jackson Pollock didn’t pull his art out of...”
“His ass?”
“I was thinking thin air, but your phrasing makes the point more emphatically. Pollock understood European Surrealism and had studied Jung in order to gain access to his unconscious processes and to free himself of conventionally constructed art.”
“Okay, then what you’re saying is that he knew what he was doing.”
“Exactly. The very concept of an unschooled prodigy doing abstract expressionism, a style that merged two sophisticated art styles—surrealism and cubism—with automatic process is absurd, simply impossible. Look, Mr. Prager, had Sashi Bluntstone made exquisite realistic paintings beyond her years, maybe she would be taken seriously, but anyone can smear paint on a canvas and say they are aping Pollock... including an ape!”
“Don’t you think her paintings have any merit at all?”
“Yes, I suppose, but not to a serious artist and not in the serious art world. I don’t so much object to the paintings as much as I do to where fools and uneducated critics place them. And in all honesty, Mr. Prager, I am not close to being Sashi Bluntstone’s most vociferous or meanspirited critic. Here...” Rusk tapped something out on the keyboard of his wafer-thin laptop and spun it around so as to face me.
I could scarcely believe what appeared on the screen. It was a rendering of three crosses on a hill under an ominous black sky. There were bloodied and brutalized bodies crucified on two of the crosses. To the far left was a naked man, hands amputated, his torso speared in so many places he looked like a pin cushion. The plaque behind his head read Kinkade. On the far right cross was a young girl’s body, her vagina afire, an arrow through her head, and her torso covered in blood splatter à la Pollock. The letters on the plaque behind her head spelled out Bluntstone. On the middle cross was the body of a frail young man wearing a thorny crown and the mutilation to his body was meant to replicate the damage done to Christ. His expression was beatific. His plaque read Martyr. I’d seen enough and turned the computer back around to Rusk.
“You see my point?” Rusk asked.
“Who is this guy?”
“Nathan Martyr. About ten years ago he was a hot new commodity, but his work quickly fell out of favor and he devolved into a very bitter man. He has a particular distaste for Thomas Kinkade and Sashi Bluntstone. But he’s not alone. There are many such sites.”
“Do you happen to know where I can find Mr. Martyr?”
“I don’t have an address for him, but he used to show at the Brill Gallery on West Twenty-third Street in Manhattan. They should have an address for him.”
I stood up. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Rusk. It’s
“That, Mr. Prager, is a very easy question to answer. Art, in this case, painting, is more, much more than what appears on the canvas. Art is also what goes on in the artist’s mind before and during and after putting brush to canvas. Art is a continuum that stretches from conception to reaction and beyond.”
“Okay, let’s say I buy that. On the other hand, I’ve seen a lot of Sashi’s work,” I said, “and I know this is going to upset you, but it’s pretty good. I’m no art critic and certainly not the curator of a museum, but I know a little bit about art. Her work is undeniably reminiscent of Kandinsky and Pollock.”
Rusk clapped his hands together and laughed. “Ah, Mr. Prager, for an artist to produce work that is reminiscent of her forebears, mustn’t she be aware of those forebears? Jackson Pollock didn’t pull his art out of...”
“His ass?”
“I was thinking thin air, but your phrasing makes the point more emphatically. Pollock understood European Surrealism and had studied Jung in order to gain access to his unconscious processes and to free himself of conventionally constructed art.”
“Okay, then what you’re saying is that he knew what he was doing.”
“Exactly. The very concept of an unschooled prodigy doing abstract expressionism, a style that merged two sophisticated art styles—surrealism and cubism—with automatic process is absurd, simply impossible. Look, Mr. Prager, had Sashi Bluntstone made exquisite realistic paintings beyond her years, maybe she would be taken seriously, but anyone can smear paint on a canvas and say they are aping Pollock... including an ape!”
“Don’t you think her paintings have any merit at all?”
“Yes, I suppose, but not to a serious artist and not in the serious art world. I don’t so much object to the paintings as much as I do to where fools and uneducated critics place them. And in all honesty, Mr. Prager, I am not close to being Sashi Bluntstone’s most vociferous or meanspirited critic. Here...” Rusk tapped something out on the keyboard of his wafer-thin laptop and spun it around so as to face me.
I could scarcely believe what appeared on the screen. It was a rendering of three crosses on a hill under an ominous black sky. There were bloodied and brutalized bodies crucified on two of the crosses. To the far left was a naked man, hands amputated, his torso speared in so many places he looked like a pin cushion. The plaque behind his head read Kinkade. On the far right cross was a young girl’s body, her vagina afire, an arrow through her head, and her torso covered in blood splatter à la Pollock. The letters on the plaque behind her head spelled out Bluntstone. On the middle cross was the body of a frail young man wearing a thorny crown and the mutilation to his body was meant to replicate the damage done to Christ. His expression was beatific. His plaque read Martyr. I’d seen enough and turned the computer back around to Rusk.
“You see my point?” Rusk asked.
“Who is this guy?”
“Nathan Martyr. About ten years ago he was a hot new commodity, but his work quickly fell out of favor and he devolved into a very bitter man. He has a particular distaste for Thomas Kinkade and Sashi Bluntstone. But he’s not alone. There are many such sites.”
“Do you happen to know where I can find Mr. Martyr?”
“I don’t have an address for him, but he used to show at the Brill Gallery on West Twenty-third Street in Manhattan. They should have an address for him.”
I stood up. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Rusk. It’s
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