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Authors: Elizabeth Hickey
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carriage whistling “My Vienna,” which was unlike him. He did not look at all angry, but I thought maybe his cheerfulness was for the benefit of the driver.
“Would you like to stop at Demel’s on the way home? Don’t they have a chocolate walnut torte that you like?”
What had Klimt said to him? I never found out.
I showed my drawings to Helene when I got home.
“What are they supposed to be?” she asked. I told her.
“No wonder he picked you,” she said. “It’s going to cost a fortune before you can draw.” She brightened for a moment. “But you did these on purpose, right? So you wouldn’t have to go anymore?” She saw my face. “Oh.”
The next Saturday my father took me to Klimt’s house. And the next, and the next. Every Saturday I sat at the table with the red cloth. At the second lesson I progressed to spheres drawn with the flat of the charcoal, for volume. I drew with my eyes closed. I drew without looking at the paper. I drew in loops and squiggles, in one unbroken line, in sharp crosshatchings. I drew things I would never have thought to draw: a book lying open on the table, a dead pigeon. At the end of the lesson Mrs. Klimt always brought out raisin scones in a woven basket, and poured coffee for Klimt, steamed milk for me. I tried to unobtrusively pick out the raisins.
Klimt was generally patient and cheerful, but several things I did made him crazy. For one thing, after the first lesson I refused to wear the smock. I didn’t want to look ugly while I was drawing, I said. He reminded me that no one cared in the least what I looked like. Were Ingres’s drawings rejected by the Beaux Arts because his hair was awry? Was Toulouse-Lautrec barred from painting because he was deformed? But I was obdurate. When I got home I shook the charcoal dust from my dresses and brushed my shoes and coat, but my sisters still took to calling me the scullery maid.
I held the charcoal wrong, he said. It wasn’t a fistful of money, it was a skein of silk to be unwound. Held too tightly it would catch or snare. I said that if I held it too loosely I would drop it. He said held too tightly I would break it, that I was supposed to trust it. How can I trust it, I thought, when it gives me these horrible, ugly drawings? I drew better when I was a baby and I was allowed to scribble on the back of used wrapping paper. But I said nothing and tried to do as he asked.
But his main complaint was that I was too impatient, that I didn’t take enough time to look. I wanted to be good, but I didn’t want it enough to submit fully to the grueling apprenticeship. That was true. I was never patient. And at twelve it’s hard to look at anything for long, except oneself.
One Saturday he met me at the door and said we were going to the Volksgarten.
I had ridden with my father in the carriage for half an hour to get to his house. It was more than a half hour back to the center of town. Why hadn’t he made arrangements the week before? And how were we going to get there?
On the train, he said. Why were we going to the Volksgarten, I wanted to know. Was I going to draw flowers, or people, or the tempietto? I was to leave my sketchbook behind, he said. For an hour I was to do nothing but look. It seemed no different from looking out of the window, and was a welcome relief from the tedious exercises.
It was noisy on the train. We stood without speaking on the platform where the cars attached, as the train stopped and started. I concentrated on not losing my footing and accidentally bumping his sleeve.
We got off at the Karlsplatz. I had never been alone with him before and I had no idea what to say as we walked. I waited and looked down at my skirt, whipping itself into whitecaps in the wind. The speckled leaves under my feet were as soggy as bread dipped in milk. We had spent so many bright fall Saturdays sitting indoors, why had he decided that today was the day to go to the park? Was he exasperated by my poor
“Would you like to stop at Demel’s on the way home? Don’t they have a chocolate walnut torte that you like?”
What had Klimt said to him? I never found out.
I showed my drawings to Helene when I got home.
“What are they supposed to be?” she asked. I told her.
“No wonder he picked you,” she said. “It’s going to cost a fortune before you can draw.” She brightened for a moment. “But you did these on purpose, right? So you wouldn’t have to go anymore?” She saw my face. “Oh.”
The next Saturday my father took me to Klimt’s house. And the next, and the next. Every Saturday I sat at the table with the red cloth. At the second lesson I progressed to spheres drawn with the flat of the charcoal, for volume. I drew with my eyes closed. I drew without looking at the paper. I drew in loops and squiggles, in one unbroken line, in sharp crosshatchings. I drew things I would never have thought to draw: a book lying open on the table, a dead pigeon. At the end of the lesson Mrs. Klimt always brought out raisin scones in a woven basket, and poured coffee for Klimt, steamed milk for me. I tried to unobtrusively pick out the raisins.
Klimt was generally patient and cheerful, but several things I did made him crazy. For one thing, after the first lesson I refused to wear the smock. I didn’t want to look ugly while I was drawing, I said. He reminded me that no one cared in the least what I looked like. Were Ingres’s drawings rejected by the Beaux Arts because his hair was awry? Was Toulouse-Lautrec barred from painting because he was deformed? But I was obdurate. When I got home I shook the charcoal dust from my dresses and brushed my shoes and coat, but my sisters still took to calling me the scullery maid.
I held the charcoal wrong, he said. It wasn’t a fistful of money, it was a skein of silk to be unwound. Held too tightly it would catch or snare. I said that if I held it too loosely I would drop it. He said held too tightly I would break it, that I was supposed to trust it. How can I trust it, I thought, when it gives me these horrible, ugly drawings? I drew better when I was a baby and I was allowed to scribble on the back of used wrapping paper. But I said nothing and tried to do as he asked.
But his main complaint was that I was too impatient, that I didn’t take enough time to look. I wanted to be good, but I didn’t want it enough to submit fully to the grueling apprenticeship. That was true. I was never patient. And at twelve it’s hard to look at anything for long, except oneself.
One Saturday he met me at the door and said we were going to the Volksgarten.
I had ridden with my father in the carriage for half an hour to get to his house. It was more than a half hour back to the center of town. Why hadn’t he made arrangements the week before? And how were we going to get there?
On the train, he said. Why were we going to the Volksgarten, I wanted to know. Was I going to draw flowers, or people, or the tempietto? I was to leave my sketchbook behind, he said. For an hour I was to do nothing but look. It seemed no different from looking out of the window, and was a welcome relief from the tedious exercises.
It was noisy on the train. We stood without speaking on the platform where the cars attached, as the train stopped and started. I concentrated on not losing my footing and accidentally bumping his sleeve.
We got off at the Karlsplatz. I had never been alone with him before and I had no idea what to say as we walked. I waited and looked down at my skirt, whipping itself into whitecaps in the wind. The speckled leaves under my feet were as soggy as bread dipped in milk. We had spent so many bright fall Saturdays sitting indoors, why had he decided that today was the day to go to the park? Was he exasperated by my poor
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