Read Online The Planet on the Table by Kim Stanley Robinson - Free Book Online
Authors: Kim Stanley Robinson
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window nook that overlooked the tile rooftops of the lower city while she finished chopping up the vegetables for a large salad.
“Do you know this painting’s history?” Freya asked, looking up from a dissected head of lettuce.
I shook my head. “Up until now the thing has not been of overwhelming interest to me.”
“A confession of faulty aesthetics. The work was photographed at the original exhibit in 1895; Durand-Ruel photo 5828 L8451. All of the information appended to the photo fits our painting—same name, size, signature location. Then for a century it disappeared. Odd. But it turned out to have been in the estate of an Evans family, in Aylesbury, England. When the family had some conservation work done on one corner it returned to public knowledge, and was photographed for a dozen books of the twenty-first and twenty-second centuries. After that it slipped back into obscurity, but it is as well documented as any of the series belonging to private estates.”
“Exactly my point,” I said. “How could such a history be forged?”
As Freya mixed the salad she smiled. “I sat and thought about that for quite some time myself. But consider it freshly, Nathaniel. How do we know what we know of the past?”
“Well,” I said, somewhat at a loss. “From data banks, I suppose. And books—documents—historians—”
“From historians!” She laughed. She provided us both with bowls and sat across from me. As I filled mine she said, “So we want to know something of the past. We go to our library and sit at its terminal. We call up general reference works, or a bibliographic index, and we choose, if we want, books that we would like to have in our hands. We type in the appropriate code, our printer prints up the appropriate book, and the volume slides out of the computer into our waiting grasp.” She paused to fork down several mouthfuls of salad. “So we learn about the past using computer programs. And a clever programmer, you see, can change a program. It would be possible to
insert
extra pages into these old books on Monet, and thus add the forged painting to the record of the past.”
I paused, a cherry tomato hovering before my mouth. “But—”
“I searched for an original of any of these books containing photos of our painting,” Freya said. “I called all over Mercury, and to several incunabulists in libraries on Earth— you wouldn’t believe the phone bill I’ve run up. But the initial printings of these art volumes were very small, and although first editions probably remain
somewhere
, they are not to be found. Certainly there are no first editions of these books on Mercury, and none immediately locatable on Earth. It began to seem a very unlikely coincidence, as if these volumes contained pictures of our painting precisely because they existed only in the data banks, and thus could be altered without discovery.”
She attended to her salad, and we finished eating in silence. All the while my mind was spinning furiously, and when we were done I said, “What about the original exhibit photo?”
She nodded, pleased with me. “That, apparently, is genuine. But the Durand-Ruel photos include four or five of paintings that have never been seen since. In that sense the Rouen cathedral series is a good one for a faker; from the first it has never been clear how many cathedrals Monet painted. The usual number given is thirty-two, but there are more in the Durand-Ruel list, and a faker could examine the list and use one of the lost items as a prescription for his fake. Providing a later history with the aid of these obscure art books would result in a fairly complete pedigree.”
“But could such an addition to the data banks be made?”
“It would be easiest done on Earth,” Freya said. “But there is no close security guarding the banks containing old art books. No one expects them to be tampered with.”
“It’s astonishing,” I said with a wave of my fork, “it is
“Do you know this painting’s history?” Freya asked, looking up from a dissected head of lettuce.
I shook my head. “Up until now the thing has not been of overwhelming interest to me.”
“A confession of faulty aesthetics. The work was photographed at the original exhibit in 1895; Durand-Ruel photo 5828 L8451. All of the information appended to the photo fits our painting—same name, size, signature location. Then for a century it disappeared. Odd. But it turned out to have been in the estate of an Evans family, in Aylesbury, England. When the family had some conservation work done on one corner it returned to public knowledge, and was photographed for a dozen books of the twenty-first and twenty-second centuries. After that it slipped back into obscurity, but it is as well documented as any of the series belonging to private estates.”
“Exactly my point,” I said. “How could such a history be forged?”
As Freya mixed the salad she smiled. “I sat and thought about that for quite some time myself. But consider it freshly, Nathaniel. How do we know what we know of the past?”
“Well,” I said, somewhat at a loss. “From data banks, I suppose. And books—documents—historians—”
“From historians!” She laughed. She provided us both with bowls and sat across from me. As I filled mine she said, “So we want to know something of the past. We go to our library and sit at its terminal. We call up general reference works, or a bibliographic index, and we choose, if we want, books that we would like to have in our hands. We type in the appropriate code, our printer prints up the appropriate book, and the volume slides out of the computer into our waiting grasp.” She paused to fork down several mouthfuls of salad. “So we learn about the past using computer programs. And a clever programmer, you see, can change a program. It would be possible to
insert
extra pages into these old books on Monet, and thus add the forged painting to the record of the past.”
I paused, a cherry tomato hovering before my mouth. “But—”
“I searched for an original of any of these books containing photos of our painting,” Freya said. “I called all over Mercury, and to several incunabulists in libraries on Earth— you wouldn’t believe the phone bill I’ve run up. But the initial printings of these art volumes were very small, and although first editions probably remain
somewhere
, they are not to be found. Certainly there are no first editions of these books on Mercury, and none immediately locatable on Earth. It began to seem a very unlikely coincidence, as if these volumes contained pictures of our painting precisely because they existed only in the data banks, and thus could be altered without discovery.”
She attended to her salad, and we finished eating in silence. All the while my mind was spinning furiously, and when we were done I said, “What about the original exhibit photo?”
She nodded, pleased with me. “That, apparently, is genuine. But the Durand-Ruel photos include four or five of paintings that have never been seen since. In that sense the Rouen cathedral series is a good one for a faker; from the first it has never been clear how many cathedrals Monet painted. The usual number given is thirty-two, but there are more in the Durand-Ruel list, and a faker could examine the list and use one of the lost items as a prescription for his fake. Providing a later history with the aid of these obscure art books would result in a fairly complete pedigree.”
“But could such an addition to the data banks be made?”
“It would be easiest done on Earth,” Freya said. “But there is no close security guarding the banks containing old art books. No one expects them to be tampered with.”
“It’s astonishing,” I said with a wave of my fork, “it is
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