‘Muriel, can we see what she looks like with the Statue of Liberty crown on?’
Latisha leaned down to allow the Englishwoman to place the crown upon her head, then stood at her full regal height, the gazes of the other three falling across her like heat. She couldn’t help smiling to herself, imagining what her mother would have said if she were still alive, to have seen her dressed up as a version of the Statue of Liberty. She figured a hundred years ago people would have been shot for less disrespectful acts, and it was still a criminal offence to set fire to the Stars and Stripes, yet here she was, with her bosoms hanging out, the liberty crown on her head, not knowing whether it was an homage or a criticism of the American values the statue personified. And although she didn’t understand how this curious process of dressing up and mimicking paintings already in existence could be considered art, she recognised the passion and craft with which Susie Thomas pulled together all the different elements of the artwork. She’d seen it before, modelling for Maxine.
‘So the plaque goes in her left hand, the torch in her right hand,’ Susie commanded.
Muriel immediately handed the two props to Latisha: the torch, made of polyester foam and spray-painted, was instantly recognisable; the plaque – also deceptively light – had the same Latin inscription and date on it as the original held by Liberty.
‘And you want her like the figure in the painting?’
‘Face in full profile, body at three-quarters,’ Susie instructed.
Latisha turned for her.
‘Thank you… ’ Susie checked the piece of paper Alfie had given her earlier, a print of Gustav Klimt’s Beethoven Frieze. ‘Laura, is it?’
‘That’s right, Miss Thomas.’ Latisha had given her mother’s name rather than her own, not wanting to risk being recognised or identified as the woman Susie had tried to get in touch with.
‘You’re doing great, Laura. Can you hold the plaque down by your side like you’re holding a book, and the torch in your other hand, also by your side, just letting it flop down slightly?’
Latisha followed her instructions exactly, feeling like a big doll that was being manipulated, while Susie’s assistant Alfie took photographs and Muriel adjusted the props.
‘She looks perfect,’ Susie remarked.
Alfie stepped back and examined Latisha’s pose critically. ‘Culturally, it’s going to be a loaded image, especially if you have the blonde behind as a Marilyn Monroe lookalike. And if you make the huge ape figure King Kong, with his teeth referencing the Manhattan skyline, with the Twin Towers still in there, it’s going to be strong, very strong.’
‘Can I move now? This crown is real heavy,’ Latisha asked from the other side of the room.
‘You got what you wanted?’ Alfie asked Susie.
Susie looked over at the painting. Apart from her skin colour, the woman’s figure matched the proportions of the figure in the painting, her profile an African-American version of the same face. Yet she felt she’d seen the model before – her shape and girth triggered a memory.
‘Yeah, she can move.’
‘You can relax now,’ Alfie instructed Latisha, who stepped down from the podium and wandered, still in costume, over to the copy of the original painting sitting on the easel in the centre of the studio.
‘Where did you find her?’ Susie asked Alfie, once she thought Latisha was out of earshot.
‘I didn’t, she found me. Just phoned me out of the blue. I’m figuring she probably got my number from the circuit somehow. Life models tend to clue other life models in to potential work.’
‘Interesting. Her name’s Laura, right?’
Alfie nodded.
‘Did she give a home address?’ Susie persisted, intuition prickling at the back of her scalp.
‘Nope, and she’s insisting on being paid in cash – which is fine by us, right? I mean, we’re avoiding agent’s fees anyway by using her.’
‘Sounds good.’
Susie watched the massive black woman examine the work on the easel. ‘She’s got a powerful presence, that’s for sure. Does she look familiar to you?’
‘Only as an archetype, if that’s what you mean?’
‘I dunno. I just feel like I’ve seen her before.’ Susie walked over to join Latisha, still staring at the easel.
‘So what do you think of the original Klimt painting?’ she asked.
‘It’s kind of scary – like this big ape here: he looks frightened, like if he’s a real player, he don’t know what to do with his women. This one at the top left-hand corner, reaching over the others – she look like death itself, coming to get him. And the other dark-haired women around her, they hungry. But all of them are beautiful – except this woman, who’s me in this painting. This woman, she’s white, covered in jewels and fat. She ain’t starving, she ain’t beautiful, she just looking on like a queen.’
‘The painting is by a 19th-century Austrian artist called Gustav Klimt. He was mainly known for his ornamental, sensual depictions of women, so this painting is unusual for him. It’s part of a bigger painting called Beethoven Frieze, referencing Beethoven’s work and German mythology. I find it disturbing in a way I like – it makes a great basis for my own interpretation.’
‘And that’s another thing I don’t understand: how can this be art? You’re making a painting that’s already being made, and you ain’t even the original painter?’
‘Because my reworking of the original image is an ironic postmodern take – this makes it mine. I’m merely referencing it, not reproducing it. There is no such thing as originality anyhow. Everything we see in art is referencing something else – some 19th-century art references works from the century before, or classical works.’
‘Just because I ain’t gone to college doesn’t mean I don’t have an eye.’
‘Absolutely. But art appreciation has gone way beyond the viewer’s immediate visual experience. It has a whole vocabulary now.’
‘Yeah, for rich people who can afford the dictionary,’ Latisha retorted, more aggressively than she had intended.
Surprised at her directness, Susie studied her. ‘Have we met before?’
‘I don’t think so, Miss Thomas. And I apologise for snapping. I get frustrated by things I don’t understand right away. You famous, right?’
‘I guess so.’
‘You are. I found you in the New York Public Library, so you must be,’ Latisha continued, playing as naive as she could while watching every reaction in the artist’s face. ‘It’s hard for a lot of artists to get galleries, to make a real living. How’s it feel to be as famous as you? I mean, you can wake up tomorrow and make anything you like – and I mean anything – knowing it’s gonna sell for thousands of dollars.’
The rest of the studio had fallen quiet. Susie realised everyone was listening in on the conversation.
Concerned, Alfie appeared by her side. ‘Is there a problem here, Susie?’
‘No, no problem, Laura has some interesting questions, that’s all.’ She turned back to Latisha. ‘How does it feel? It feels like it could be taken away from me at any given moment. All of it. Just like that. I feel like a fraud.’
It was the first time she’d admitted such a thing out loud, but it was one of those confessions one could only make to a stranger. Around her she could feel the others reacting, as if the whole room had inhaled sharply. But the massive semi-naked black woman simply gave a half-smile. It was the only time Susie could see she might be beautiful.
‘That’s because you an outsider, like me,’ she told Susie. ‘And you know what? Outsiders are survivors ’cause they start with no expectation, only the expectation they are going to have to fight every inch. They are born with a hunger. It’s the insiders – them highborn types, who expect success and recognition to tumble into their lap – that have no hunger. And when they fail, they fall. Sometimes the shock kills them.’
It was the summary of that old argument Susie used to always have with Maxine: how coming f
rom nothing gave one the drive that the privileged never experienced. How did this complete stranger know that?
‘Who are you?’ Susie found herself asking.
Latisha paused, fighting the temptation to tell Susie the truth, but Maxine’s voice was whispering at the back of her head, telling her to wait, play her hand first.
‘Laura Johnson. It says so on that form your assistant is holding.’ She pointed to the clipboard in Alfie’s hand. ‘Laura Johnson, 64 years old, from Brooklyn. I’m nobody,’ she lied.
*
It was only later, when Susie was locking up the studio, that she came across the envelope addressed to her. It had been slipped into the bag she kept all her idea and sketchbooks in. A plain white envelope with her first name scrawled in large, loopy handwriting on the front. Inside there was no note, only a wad of ten yellowing blank sheets of paper. As an artist she was surrounded by notebooks, pads, sheets, swatches, papers and fabrics of every description. So why did these seem so familiar?
Chapter Fifteen
Met Gala, Costume Institute
The entrance to the Met was roped off and the red carpet had been rolled along the pavement and down to the section where the limos were expected to pull up. A bank of expectant photographers was visible behind a long hedge that had been put into place for the occasion, and pushed up against the velvet ropes was a crowd of eager fans, wide-eyed and flushed with excitement.
Susie, who had an ambivalent attitude toward such events, hobbled down the red carpet – which seemed, at that moment, endless. Dressed in a gown that had been selected from the top fashion graduates from Central Saint Martins in London through a competition Baum Galleries had run for the occasion (more promotion), Susie resembled the ancient British queen Boudicca herself crossed with a punk goddess. The dress, made of red, white and blue net, had a skintight sheath of royal-blue satin as the undergarment. It had taken eight hours to prepare and Baum Galleries had flown in both the designer and a stylist from London to dress and style the artist. Blue tattoos, an homage to the woad dye Celtic warriors painted themselves with before battle against the Romans, spiralled up one arm, along the left side of her neck and left cheek. Her hair was swept up into a high chignon that was structured around a stuffed raven (crouching, beak open in attack) perched atop her head. Already a little drunk from the considerable amount of champagne she’d consumed during the fitting, and buzzing from a couple of lines of cocaine Felix had pressed upon her (and the fact that she’d fasted to fit into the skintight dress), she felt invincible. It doesn’t get much better than this, she thought to herself, feeling curiously detached from the persona that was tottering along the red carpet in eight-inch Union Jack-patterned platform shoes. The part of her that was untouched by the cocaine was nervous, and felt, frankly, fraudulent, as if her talent and reputation as an artist did not justify being lauded in a gathering of such stellar celebrities, some of whom had peppered her adolescence as untouchable demigods seen only on posters and screen. It was still extraordinary to her that she was now considered to be in the same league, and she was thankful to be in this glorified fancy dress and able to hide behind a role. The ball was, after all, entitled ‘AngloMania: Tradition and Transgression in British Fashion’ – and there wasn’t anyone more transgressive than Susie Thomas in the arts, except perhaps Banksy.
I am Boudicca, so fuck you, John Galliano… and Sarah Jessica Parker and, shit, was that Scarlett Johannson? The internal monologue ran on as each celebrity floated down the red carpet in a blaze of camera flashes and shouting. When her turn came to step in front of the bank of paparazzi, she clutched the arm of her allotted escort for the night – an A-list film star on the wane, hoping to capitalise on her notoriety – and followed his cue. A handsome over-buffed man in his early forties, hands shaking from the amphetamines he’d consumed in preparation, the star posed with professional panache.
‘Fucking animals,’ he murmured softly to Susie, as he adopted a megawatt smile with the ease of a performing monkey. ‘Carrion-eaters to whom we, the famous, are forever indebted. You look absolutely amazing, my dear, and if that doesn’t get us plastered all over MySpace, nothing will. Say cheese for the apes,’ he instructed, turning so that the photographers could get his most flattering angles. Then, after modelling with Susie by his side, his hand slipped around her waist (as directed by Baum’s publicist, Martha Keller, who was determined to fan all rumours) and he guided her onwards and upwards towards the entrance of the museum.
*
Behind the rope and sandwiched between a Japanese TV crew and four screaming teenagers, Latisha, using her height and bulk to secure a prime viewing position, watched Susie’s antics on the red carpet. To her eyes the artist resembled a fallen angel, with a raven like a terrible omen perched on top of all her red hair. She looked completely different to the way she’d appeared at the studio the day before, dishevelled in paint-stained jeans and T-shirt, hair a loose wild bush about her face. Here she reminded Latisha of a painting of a saint who’d sold her soul to the devil: beautiful, strong and burning up. Now she could see why Maxine had loved her.
Latisha had taken the subway downtown to the opening of the ball because the New York Post had stated that the maverick British artist would be there. She’d also read how Susie was famous for her ‘erotic’ photographs, the drug and sex scandals and a string of broken relationships she had apparently left behind in England. The article, entitled ‘Queen of Sex Art Graces the Big Apple’, appeared beside an old photograph of a younger Susie Thomas emerging from a London club bedraggled and drunk. It also mentioned that the prestigious Baum Gallery would host Thomas’s first solo US show in July, and that there was a rumour the art gallery director – the omnipotent Felix Baum – had been banned from seeing the work until the show opened – a historical first for an artist. The article raved about the extraordinary money rich people now paid for a Susie Thomas work – hundreds of thousands of dollars, sometimes, millions.
Although Latisha knew all this, to see it in print amazed her. How come Maxine had ended up in East Harlem in a rent-controlled apartment, she kept wondering. What was it that had driven the young sculptor so far from the lifestyle and company she normally kept? As if to answer her question, Felix Baum, dressed in tartan trousers and a shirt, waistcoat and jacket that looked to her like it belonged to a 19th-century bartender, appeared at the far end of the red carpet with an impossibly tall and impossibly blonde young woman on his arm. As they drew nearer, Latisha could see that the girl, obviously a model, was of Eurasian background, her Asiatic eyes in direct contrast to her almost albino colouring and pale blonde hair. The girl was as tall as Felix himself, perhaps even a couple of inches taller in her high heels, and they made a striking couple. They were greeted by a barrage of flashbulbs until an uber-famous film star and his wife took to the carpet just behind Felix and his companion. The paparazzi, like vultures interested in a better piece of fresh kill, immediately swung from Felix and his partner to the other couple, turning their cameras like one multi-eyed animal.
Transfixed, Latisha stared as Felix and his companion swept past, so close she could smell the woman’s exotic perfume. For a moment Felix’s gaze seemed to settle on her and Latisha found herself holding her breath, wondering whether he would recognise her from all those months ago when Maxine had introduced them at the group exhibition. Instead his gaze moved on blindly and indifferently. As Latisha suspected at the time, to Felix she had been less than a piece of furniture, a prop in the background noise – forgettable, of no value to him either professionally or personally. Expedient, like Maxine turned out to be for him. He’s gonna pay for that attitude, Latisha told herself. He’s gonna end up remembering me big time.
*
On the other side of the red carpet Gabriel Bandini was busy trying to push himself to the front of the bustling fans. Being slight and small was proving to be an advantage; he ducked under the barrier and squeezed in between an overweight gossip columnist giving her
commentary into a microphone and a security guard who, arms outspread, was holding back the fans.
Gabriel’s panic had grown and he’d woken up earlier that day with an overwhelming desire to see Felix, whatever the risk. Knowing that he wouldn’t be welcome either at the gallery or at the gallery director’s apartment uptown, he’d decided that seeing him at a distance might be enough to take the edge off what had become an uncontrollable urge. I am addicted. I am addicted to the bastard, Gabriel thought, with the helplessness of someone who knows his own nature, as he caught sight of Felix’s head above the others. And there he was, looking extraordinarily composed, aloof and impossibly handsome, an exotic girl with the vacuous expression of the professionally beautiful floating along the red carpet beside him. Gabriel’s stomach clenched and his heart jolted as if it had received an electrical shock. Swept up by the fans around him shouting out the names of the actors walking the carpet, he reached out across the barrier and called out: ‘Felix! Felix!’
Recognising the voice, the gallery director turned toward the flashing cameras, trying to peer beyond the medley to place the voice. After a second of blindly peering into the crowd, he gave up and deftly manoeuvred the fashion model (who must have been six foot five in her heels) up the carpeted marble stairs.
Gabriel watched in dismay as they disappeared into the museum entrance.
Afterwards, as he moved to the walkway, he noticed a tall, large black woman in her sixties looming over the heads of the jostling photographers. Something about the way she, too, appeared transfixed by Felix Baum’s retreating figure resonated with him.
It didn’t make sense; why would a woman like that be interested in a gallerist, when the red carpet was awash with far more famous celebrities – unless she had a personal interest? It had to be the woman who’d broken into his apartment. She matched the description Chung had given. As she began to move off, he saw that she was walking with a crutch.
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