The artist had established himself upon the Japanese butterfly stool at the quayside shortly before noon, since then he’d worked upon a small canvas, supplementing the chaos of colour that had existed prior to his securing it within the easel. A sample of each colour decorated his hands and trousers. The flesh of the former was a sun-rich brown; the fabric of the latter had been long ago. A faded blue cotton vest covered his narrow torso. His lean arms were deeply tanned and thickly haired. A wide-brimmed straw hat cast an impenetrable shadow over the upper portion of his face; the lower portion narrowed to a sharp hairless chin. Upon his feet were laceless, brown leather boots, the soles of which were held in place by fishing twine. Every hour and without reference to his wristwatch – a Hamilton Flight II inherited from his father that hadn’t worked for three decades – the artist lit a cigarette. While smoking, his eyes focused upon the horizon, or the birds lacing and looping above the sea, and it was not uncommon for each cigarette to extinguish itself without his taking a second puff. But he appeared careless and, having flattened the cork filter with a worn heel, would resume working.
∙
The time was a fraction past six and the sun was two hours shy of the horizon. The artist was hunched upon the stool, his head lowered, and a cigarette smouldered between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand. He appeared to be sleeping.
The tourist stood behind the artist for several minutes appraising the canvas. His intention had been to stroll to the quay-end and back prior to taking his evening meal, but the artist’s work had stalled him. The tourist experienced immediate disgust towards the canvas. The splashes and daubs debased the sublime seascape, constituting the art of decadence he frequently read about in the daily newspaper he purchased and thoroughly read. He snorted disdainfully, recalling the occasion of his visit to the Capital’s Museum of Modern Art when he queued for three hours to gaze upon the works of the Dadaists. Upon entering the exhibition he’d experienced not insignificant sensory discomfort: a recreation of Wieland Herzfelde’sPrussian Archangel – a pig cadaver in German military dress – brought him out in a cold sweat; Hans Arp’s Rectangles Arranged According to the Laws of Chance blurred his vision; quotations from Dada’s founders dominated entire walls and turned his stomach; and, during a re-enactment of the Dadaist’s first Zurich soiree at the Cabaret Voltaire he lost his reasoning and was forcibly ejected from the building.
‘Is it not to your liking?’ the artist enquired.
Flattening the cork filter of his cigarette with a worn heel, he turned to the tourist. Shrugging his shoulders as though inviting a response, he offered his packet of cigarettes.
‘No,’ the tourist replied, his thick black and grey hair, combed back from the brow, accentuating his frown.
‘Integrity is much maligned,’ the artist conceded, standing to light the tourist’s cigarette.
‘It’s not what you see,’ the tourist challenged, gesturing beyond the canvas.
‘Of course not,’ the artist concurred. ‘I’m not interested in the sea. This is where I’m inspired. What I paint is within my head,’ he explained. ‘Or here,’ he added, extracting a brown leather-bound octavo-sized book from a trouser pocket and flicking through the pages. The tourist was stunned by the brilliance of the sketches upon every page. ‘A month of ideas,’ the artist murmured. ‘But there’s never sufficient time.’
‘For what?’ the tourist demanded.
‘I wish I knew,’ the artist chuckled.
Without haste he replaced the book; then carefully packed his materials into a large canvas bag. With a weary grunt he hoisted the bag onto one shoulder and, having removed the canvas, the easel onto the other.
