Artist Misunderstood

The mist still covered the ground when early morning joggers discovered the damp and colourful lump obstructing their path. They were annoyed, complained about youth binge-drinking and the ridiculous licensing laws, jumped over it, ran around it wearing frowns, and one distracted by his iPod, fell over it. He recoiled, realizing it was a dead body and scrambled away on all fours. He didn't ring the police, but ran into the Sydney Police Centre next door and informed them of their new adjacent crime scene.

Inner-city professionals on their way to work and homeless inhabitants of nearby refuges seeking to scrounge breakfast or a drink, took a wide birth around the area pegged out in blue and white tape, surrounded by police. They assumed it was another drunk with his head bashed in, or someone else they didn't know.

A rotund man summoned to the crime scene stood by Detective Inspector Jock Hammersmith. The man's business card had been found on the body. The detective lifted the sheet and the gentleman, an art dealer, identified the corpse.

Despite the large amount of blood, on initial inspection, only one wound was evident on the body. A small glass jar he was carrying, apparently broke on his fall, severing arteries and veins in his wrist. Although when questioned, the art dealer discounted suicide, there was no sign of foul play, or the involvement of others. Yet, why the deceased failed to seek assistance, or move in any significant way following the fall, made any determination of `accidental death' questionable.

On removing the body, the true passion of his last moments were revealed smeared on the grey concrete.

* * *

When a child, Aubrey Jones received a paint box of watercolours as a gift and from that time on he was fascinated with water, and paint. He painted trees, and boats, and horses and dogs, the odd house with chimney and smoke, and fantasy pictures of his family holding hands with a big yellow sun in the sky. He loved the way the paint flowed mixed with water.

He was happy when his mother and grandmother stuck his playful efforts on their fridges.

"You are very artistic!", "You are quite the budding artist!", "That is beautiful, Aubrey!" they would say. And he would run out the back door to find something else to paint, or paint on. When he ran out of drawing paper, he used newspaper and when he could no longer find any of that, he'd paint on anything at hand.

At ten years old, water and paint became his weapon of choice. He painted the family car and his mother laughed - his father beat him. This parental division became the mold for future receptions to his chosen course. His mother sat with him at the kitchen table and helped him with his primary school projects. They were studied and articulate, full of neat, organized pasted cut-outs augmented by water colour borders and illustrations. For his project on Japan he received an A.

At sixteen he was required to select subjects for his final years at high school. He chose Art as one elective. Terrible arguments ensued with his father, who wanted to know why Metalwork and Woodwork, which led to jobs, weren't Art. To which he didn't have an answer, though his mother remained sympathetic. She tried to make him see a more sensible path through life. As a compromise to his father he elected Technical Drawing as a subject. For which in the final exam two years later he was given an A, while his Major Art Project drew only a C plus, for a piece so deep in adolescent meaning no one could extract it.

Undaunted, infected with the artistic spirit, he dismissed his critics as too ossified to appreciate his fresh talent. He knew every artist had his time, and his was yet to come, but when it did, they would look back on his earlier works as ground-breaking. Those that were critics now, would one day tear up their critical qualifications, ask themselves how they could have been so blind to the genius right before their eyes, leave the art world and enter the field of economic science where they always belonged.

He graduated from the Julian Ashton School of Art in an undistinguished way. They told him he was competent in various mediums, with good drawing skills. One of his sculptures had won a 3rd , but he wasn't as pleased as he might have been due to the fact he had underestimated the time required to complete it. Of his paintings, the Principals admired their crude beauty, but his imaginative conceptualization was not up to par, his work lacked an intrinsic depth. Unlike some of his classmates who went on to hold one-man/woman shows, or the majority who gave it away to pursue less aesthetic, more pecuniary occupations, he went into commercial art and began working for an advertising company.

Aubrey was earning a modest wage, his job secure and he had given up any idea of succeeding as a known artist, when one night in a bar he met a fellow from his graduating class. Supposing Aubrey's depressed mood, DeCorbus deduced his friend was frustrated, as he might be with such mundane occupation.

"My friend, your creative spirit is restless, like a snake, it is twisting inside you wanting to come out of hibernation. Your work," he snorted, "you probably do it with your eyes closed - paint something for yourself, with your eyes open. Have another drink, amigo."

"I paint and draw all day for a job, when I get home the last thing I want to do is paint."

DeCorbus leant back, holding onto the bar and shook his head. "Incomprehensible. All I can do is create, every moment of my life. You do not have an option."

Aubrey looked up from his beer. "Have to pay the bills, somehow. You're okay, you are established and doing well. People appreciate your art."

De Corbis frowned and his mouth twisted in an ugly way. "You have no idea. Do you think that I haven't struggled, starved. I lived on the street for six months, did chalk drawings on sidewalks for change. It didn't come, like that!" He snapped his fingers.

"Ah, I didn't mean to insult you, Miguel. I guess, I'm just not prepared to take the jump. I'm not as brave as you."

"I'm not that established. Life is a risk, my friend. You live it or you die, one way or another." DeCorbus hugged Aubrey about the shoulders. "Drink up!" He threw his double shot down, and slammed it on the bar.

"You must see my work. Come on, Gallery, a block away - come." He weaved his way between the tables heading for the door, when he looked over his shoulder. "Come, it will encourage you. Inspire you." He laughed and pushed at the bar door, which repelled him. Aubrey got the door, just as DeCorbus was kicking it and assaulting it with a stream of pseudo-Spanish invective re its door-ness. "No es una puerta! You couldn't be a fuckin' door - seas malido la puerta, idiota, cono ..."

They burst out into cold air of a clear winter evening. Aubrey, momentarily distracted by his breath nearly walked into a telegraph pole. DeCorbus swung about half bent getting his bearings.

"Hey, hey, hey Aubrey, I got an idea. Ven a ver, come see my paintings.The gallery down here, come - come." DeCorbus took him by the elbow and like a liner steered by a run-away tug they continued along the street.

Near the Five Ways, Paddington, they came upon a small collection of old shops converted to contemporary use. One consisted of two Victorian shop fronts combined to form an art gallery. DeCorbus rolled on his shoulder, and with his open hand slapped the plate glass window hard. Aubrey, struggling to maintain a still position, stumbling side to side like an indecisive crab, impulsively held up the flat of his hands against the glass in mute theatrical assistance as the window wobbled and looked like it might jump from the store front. DeCorbus put a hand around his ears in anticipation of the alarm.

"Shhhhh...." whispered Aubrey, and they cast their eyes about, but there was no sound save that of the window continuing to creak in its frame and a cat a way off.

DeCorbus slid face-plastered to the glass across the window. "NO, must look," he signaled with his arm for Aubrey to come closer, "come, come, look, look - here I am." `Dulce Venetaface Two Across'."

"It is fantastic, Miguel. Wonderful, play of colour, great power..."At this point he didn't know if it was representing anything.

"Have not key. But we will break in. You must see."

"No, no, someone might come later and steal your pictures." Aubrey cupped his hands about his eyes and peered into the window. "Tell me," he asked, in an attempt to further distract the Spaniard, "what is that colour you have used on the underside of the leaf - down the bottom there, sort of half in the background?"

At once, Miguel came over and shading the reflection, followed Aubrey's eye. "Ah, I see, ha-ha . . ." He pulled away and leant on the glass. "That is one of my colours, I mixed myself.

"You like these?" He nodded at Aubrey. "They are yours. I will prepare a batch tomorrow, and you shall have a small part of my genius." He laughed and tripped over his own foot.

"The key to your success," trumpeted a stumbling Aubrey loudly to dark windows.

"I wouldn't go that far, comrade!" Miguel laughed and squeezed him by the shoulders as they fell in a heap.

* * *

Miguel never showed. As the months went by Aubrey saw posters for Miguel's exhibitions, and read articles on his friend's success. Miguel had done the sets for an avant-garde version of Swan Lake which had been wowing audiences. There was a tour of his home by House and Garden, and an interview with his ex-wife, the model, in an up-market women's' magazine. All this made Aubrey increasingly dissatisfied with his lot. He took to staring at the footpath as he walked, and in the concrete he found a metaphor for his part in life. He was secured in situ like the basalt chips in cement, he was the twig, the ring tab stuck in the asphalt.

One day, following a crack in a city pavement, he came across a sapling near a gutter sprouting with an ill-founded, but optimistic gleam of leaves. Sight of the iconic clichstirred resolve within. Aubrey had managed to save some money for a trip to Europe and it burned a hole in his rationale. The plan was to immerse himself in the great art of that continent, be frustrated and inspired, yet he wondered why, when here and now, he was frustrated and inspired. Although his family was against it, his father called him a fool for the umpteenth time, his mother cried and his sister yelled at him about how irresponsible he was being, he quit his job, rented an attic studio in Surry Hills, bought materials and began to paint like a demon.

The first painting he labored over for days, the second took twenty minutes, the third he had half-finished when he was taken over by another idea and started number four. A large number of his works remained unfinished - if that is what they were - it was up to him to decide. So far as pictures others might deem complete, after a month he had approximately a dozen he would be prepared to sell. He signed the works A Jones as a personal statement directed at his tutors.

Being prepared to sell, and selling were two different things Aubrey discovered as the months rolled by and not one of his labors of love passed from his hands. Despondency overtook him and he wandered looking at the footpath. Outside the Cafde Temps, head down, he bumped into someone.

"Aubrey," said a familiar voice.

Two hands grasped Aubrey by the shoulders and he looked up into the designer-stubbled face of DeCorbus. "Miguel."

"Sorry, I didn't catch up. My friend, was I drunk, eh? I think I remember I had to fly out to Rome the next day. What a hangover."

"I made the break. Set myself up in my own studio. Been painting like mad, but haven't sold anything yet."

"Ah, prolific. I must see someday."

"Come 'round now," suggested Aubrey. "We'll have a drink."

At the studio, while DeCorbus strolled the space, passing a cursory eye over Aubrey's paintings, Aubrey retrieved a half-bottle of wine from his refrigerator and poured them a glass.

"You must keep at it, Aubrey. It is not an easy road, but if you have talent it will rise to the surface. Look at Van Gogh, or even Gauguin, they didn't have an easy time of it. But in the end, now, they are household names. That is the life of an artist. To struggle, until success dawns or you die."

"I thought someone would like my pictures - even one of them."

"Do not paint what you think people will like!" DeCorbus was outraged.

"I didn't mean that - I'm not catering to..."

DeCorbus cut him off. "I should think not!" He spat on the floor. "What do you and I know of sheep?"

Aubrey was looking at the floor where a sweltering gob now sat.

"They like grass!" Miguel laughed, and then stamping a foot, soberly added in a lofty tone, "Paint the idea, my friend."

Aubrey raised his glass. "Bugger the sheep!"

Miguel laughed, grabbed his glass and thrust it into the air. "Fuck the sheep!"

Miguel downed his glass of wine and Aubrey poured him another.

"Your tongue it is green," remarked Miguel with some surprise.

"Oh yeah," Aubrey laughed, "old habit, since a kid - keep putting the brush in my mouth."

"Stay clear of cadmium blue - it is poison."

"Yeah."

"You know Dali used snake venom as a medium for mixing his paint. Claimed it allowed a finer, smoother line."

"Sounds like Dali. Now there is an artist. If I could have one milligram of his talent, I'd gladly risk snakebite."

As DeCorbus was leaving he spied a painting by the door. "You like water - superb depiction," he told Aubrey. "Good luck, my friend."

Going down the stairs to exit the building, he said to himself, `Water. He is wet, alright.'

* * *

With no sales, and therefore no new income, Aubrey became increasingly despondent. As soon as a painting was dry to touch, it was rolled and he was off to a gallery, desperate to sell the latest product of his mind. During one low period, he actually tried to hawk his drawings - because he didn't have to wait for them to dry. There was enough evidence in the tone of his voice apparently, during his weekly chats with his mother, to warrant her sending him a cheque. It helped cover the rent for a couple of weeks. She would lie to his father.

One night, the girl, Lisa who cleaned the building, said she knew a man, Constantine, who dealt in pictures. She had seen some and reckoned Aubrey's were much better. A week later, she told him she had mentioned him to Constantine, and that if Aubrey liked she would call him to arrange a viewing of his work. Aubrey thought, `Why not?'. He was tired of walking the streets from gallery to gallery with armfuls of pictures, he couldn't afford to get framed.

Prior to the dealer's visit he strategically, though with an apparent nonchalance, placed his best paintings about the studio. There was his `Flower within Girl' , `Under Dust', `Order in Chaos', `Consumed Flowers', `Underground Bus' `Compromised Sex: Window View Without Smile' and other well-executed pieces into which he had poured his heart and intelligence and, he considered, stretched his talent to new limits.

The art dealer, Constantine rolled in around four one afternoon. He pronounced his name `Au-bree' like someone selecting cheese. Constantine moved his corpulent mass about the space on very small feet, inspecting works with a goateed poker-face.

To Aubrey's consternation, Constantine walked past paintings placed to the fore, and began poking about amongst half hidden and incomplete works like a trash and treasure picker. Holding back the flaps of his suit coat with one arm, with care he reached out and flipped through a stack of rejects with nibble fingers, eventually extracted a piece Aubrey abandoned in despair of ever escaping his advertorial/commercial past.

Aubrey looked away in shame as Constantine examined the painting at arm's length. Of the half painted over work, part of it was a representation of water, a carryover from his agency days where he had been renowned for his depiction of liquid, particularly clear water.

"The way you have used the ultra-realistic water to effect, like a colour key blue, like sky and clouds, excellent, my boy. Hmmm... what else?" Holding onto the painting, Constantine explored the other side of the apartment.

Aubrey picked up two glasses of wine. "Would you like a drink, Mr. Constantine?"

"Ah, what do we have here?" Constantine was pulling a picture out from under his bed. A Daliesque piece, after Persistence of Memory, which Aubrey was self-conscious about, of images encased in water flowing down the painting.

Constantine took the wine glass and sipped.

"These are good, novel." Constantine lifted an eyebrow while tilting the small painting in his hand. "But the others? What is the point?"

Aubrey, at first pleased, was affronted by the dealer's words, but didn't understand why. Searching the depths of his knowledge of artistic terms and interpretative appreciation left him empty handed.

Constantine lifted his hands in a wide-open appeal. "Every artist has to determine a rationale, a philosophy, a theme about his work, or a period of his work, no matter how feeble or ill-defined. Your works are a hodge-podge, as if demonstrating that you are seeking a direction for your art."

"But I put everything I had into them."

"As you may. And each painting may express a concentrated intensity, but they are exercises. Core themes to your existence, primary concerns in either style or content, or both need to span a number of works. You do have them."

"There's not a question?" Aubrey's brow creased.

"No, my dear boy. Rarely do I discourage an artist. With your permission I will include these two in an exhibition of up-comers I'll be having in October."

"Of course." Aubrey restrained his elation, smiled and shook Constantine's hand.

"How much shall I put on them?"

Aubrey massaged his brow, unable to divorce the personal cost of his entire effort thus far, from these two small representatives venturing out into the world. "I think, I will leave that up to you. You will have a better idea of their worth than I."

"Very well." Constantine pulled a card from his vest pocket and handed it to Aubrey. "Drop in and see me when you get a chance."

Constantine stopped at the door and turned about. "It was nice to meet you, Aubrey. If you can come up with, say eighteen to two dozen works, I'll consider putting on a one man show for you."

"Really. Oh thank you, thank you."

"You better get busy."

* * *

As he applied an initial wash with little idea of what he was about to paint, Aubrey pondered Constantine's words. His brush pushed the diminishing meniscus of tinted liquid across the paper in total absorption. He loaded the large brush with water once more and floated it across the surface extending the burnt umber wash. He tolerated the weak yellowish colour only because it was required for the effects of other colours layered above. He knew it was asking for disaster to commence in such a way, without a concept or a conception, or asking for some artistic muse to arise and rescue his efforts. From the contrast the partly washed paper exhibited, the idea of partition infiltrated his consciousness. Two sides, by difference, isolated a dichotomy brought into existence by a million preconditions of material, and in him. DeCorbus came to mind, and though he hated admitting it, in the dynamism and passion of the fiery character and his ability to smoothly transition into his art, he felt overshadowed, out-classed, an unclothed mannequin of an artist.

Aubrey cleaned his brush, picked up a smaller one, wet it and without thought began to apply a shade of light purple. Through the secret intent of his consciousness, form, amorphous layer by mysterious layer grew from the paper. As if by instinct white areas of highlight spared brush and paint realized their defining purpose. Before him, he saw the facial landmarks of his friend emerge in the potential guise of a waterfall across a crag of rock. He was aware of the tightrope to walk across the image between recognizance and a quality of unmolested nature. Though the idea of such a terrible and trite subterfuge repulsed him, he was lost in the challenge of the nascent work, the completion of this bastard water child compelled him, and he could but continue.

* * *

"My goodness, my boy. Is that a portrait?" Constantine unfurled the painting and pinned it against a corkboard on the wall. He stepped back a few paces, frowning while a hand pulled at his beard. "That's DeCorbus, isn't it? Ha-ha, it is. You're a devil, Aubree. I love it."

"It sort of just came out that way."

Constantine was stepping back and forward in front of the painting testing the optical transition. "It is magic."

"Thank you." Aubrey took a deep breath and released it.

After pinning the remainder of Aubrey's latest efforts on his corkboard, Constantine walked back and forth, examining each in detail and at a distance. Most of the time his expression conveyed a deadly seriousness, but occasionally Aubrey noticed the start of a smile curl a corner of his lips. He stopped, turned and gave Aubrey an appreciative grin.

"You listened to me. Despite your unspoken reservations. Yes, I know, but there is difference to betraying your principles and exploiting your strengths. Is our past to be our master? I will tell you, now, these are really brilliant. You have exceeded my expectations and surprised this seasoned dealer. Now, I don't want you take this as a criticism, but I believe your work would benefit from an increase in scale."

Aubrey's eyes opened wide as if unexpectedly kissed, and then slashed across the throat.

"I would like to see what you can do with a larger expanse. Expand your horizons."

Aubrey glanced along the corkboard at his curling paintings and rubbed his neck. An internal calculator was running up the increased cost of producing larger works and what this meant in terms of surviving in the real world. "How big?"

"Oh, sixteen hundred by twelve hundred, plus."

"Seriously?"

"It will give your work impact. But also, if I were you, I would look more deeply into your regard for water. You have used it marvelously as an effect, an implement, but what lays beneath the surface?" Constantine twisted his head and froze momentarily in a querulous open-mouthed expression. "In the meantime let me take the portrait. I'll get it framed and enter it in The Pitman competition for you."

"The Pitman Prize?" Aubrey's mind reeled and for an instant he was propelled into the artistic stratosphere and all that entailed, prior to falling back to realities, yet the giddiness persisted.

"You never know. The prize money would come in handy. You never know."

"How much?"

"Oh. $50,000."

* * *

`You never know.' Constantine's words kept repeating in Aubrey's mind, and every time they did, he banished any thought of the Pitman prize from his head and redoubled his efforts to create a new larger art for himself. As the months passed and he struggled with the challenges arising from his artistic intent, the words disappeared, as did any thought of the Pitman prize. The words of Constantine he did heed involved looking deeper into his subject, and the more he read, the more inspired he became with the wonder of water.

* * *

Constantine had opened the gallery just for her, and Jane Doyalson appreciated this privilege extended to the Herald's chief art critic. It was self-serving of Constantine, of course, but none-the-less appreciated. Not that she didn't enjoy opening night drinks and nibbles, or the energy of the crowd, and meeting her confederates, but it was no way to assess art. There was nothing worse than dodging this way and that trying to get a decent look at a painting between constantly moving bodies. Anyway, over time she had come to respect Miguel, and his unwavering ethos to his work. Some time ago he had proved himself exceptional, as any successful artist must, and this special treatment was his due.

There was the same fire, literally, in every painting regardless of subject, and in the fevered brushstrokes, but they did not scorch her senses as before. Nothing new in his treatment, and although the subjects changed, or took a new direction, the passion spent, seemed wasted. The forced concoction of images, for what purpose - to rail against false gods? Was that it?

"Society . . ." DeCorbus waved his arms about as if searching for an extent to his meaning. "Civilization." His eyes circled about as he held a trembling invisible pigeon in the cage of his clawed hands. "The Politico-capitalist system has set up material gods for us to worship and we must burn down and destroy these infernal machines. The fiery fingers of Moloch are in everything we worship."

Jane blinked and turned from the painting. Miguel really was a beautiful man - swarthy with dark wavy hair, romantic and passionate, and in those large, oily brown eyes she might lose herself, and she could not tell him she didn't get it. "I see."

As he was standing close, right next to her, and she had crossed her legs while stationary, awkwardly she had to step over her own leg in order to move along to the next painting. This too, with broken Roman columns and half-submerged shipwrecks of ancient sailing boats, complete with ancillary fire burning, not only sailor's jumping ship, but also any collective impression beyond chaos and destruction. She waited for the inevitable commentary.

"Every civilization since time began, the Romans, Greeks, the English has assumed a self-centred aloofness, and all have been undone by the forces of the natural world - which cannot be controlled. I wanted to convey the power of destruction, that exquisite pleasure when we see a car crash and explosion, or a destructive natural event."

He stopped waving his arms and he looked, as he sounded, completely serious about this. She stifled a shudder and shuffled along to the next.

"This is one of Miguel's best I think," said Constantine. "I put it on the cover of the opening guide."

Jane called over her shoulder to her photographer, "Sammy, get a shot of this one will you. Thanks."

They left Sammy to set up his lights and moved on to the next painting.

Two early works of his she had acquired hung on her wall at home. They were fresh fire at the time, she recalled, but now she was annoyed - like a favoured dish consumed too often, all his works were diminished. All pyrotechnics with token symbolism. If people wanted to see things blowing up they would go to the movies. She realized, unlike before, that capturing the explosion or conflagration in the moment, freezing it, only served to weaken its essence. Although Miguel maintained a connection, there was no comparison with the effect provided by animation, in either real life or film. His flames were limp and cold, his explosions truly flat and safely contained no matter how well he depicted them in two dimensions. There was no comparison, and her lips tightened on the realization, that his chariot of fire was a mission in vain.

* * *

Bang. Bang. Bang.

Bad noise, door?

Bang. Bang.Bang.

Door. Door. Door!

Aubrey fell out of bed and clutching a handful of his pyjama bottoms to his stomach, stumbled to the door.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

His bruised, somnolent self fought back. "HANG ON!"

He slipped the latch and opened the door. The neat young woman in front of him looked somehow familiar. Her bobbed blonde hair flowed from under a pink beret bearing a daisy pattern. Her nose was pointed and her cheekbones low which underplayed her brilliant green eyes. She was dressed neatly in a white dress with a pink belt that matched the beret.

"Here he is!" she proclaimed beaming, and walked past him into the flat.

He used his free hand to wipe the goo from his eyes and the hair from his face. "Do I know you?"

She turned on her heel and faced him. "Probably not. I'm Jane Doyalson, Art Critic with the Herald. But I know you, Aubrey, Winner of the 2013 Pitman Prize."

Aubrey's mouth gaped and his eyes tightened, presumably Jane assumed, as his brain in a mixture of suspicion and disbelief absorbed her words. "Really?"

"Really," Jane replied deadpan.

"Yahoo!" Aubrey yelled to the ceiling, clutching his hands to the side of his head. He went to run around the room but his pyjama bottoms had fallen to his ankles and he tripped up and landed flat on his face in front of Jane, his bare backside revealed.

Hastily he gathered his composure and pyjama bottoms, and stood. "I'm terribly sorry." He wiped his brow with his spare hand."It is just so unbelievable. Me?" He shook his head. Across the room his mobile phone buzzed and vibrated. "Excuse me, Jane."

Constantine's name appeared on the screen.

"Hello."

"Aubrey, I have great news. The Chairman just rang. You have won the Pitman Prize. You did it. Congratulations, my boy."

"Thank you. Thank you, Constantine. I couldn't have done it without you. I'm so stunned. Jane just told me."

"Jane? Is Jane Doyalson there already? God, she's keen. How the hell did she find out, before me? Put her on will you, Aubrey?"

"It's Constantine. He wants to talk to you." Aubrey handed her the phone.

"Constantine."

"Ah, Jane, what a beautiful bird so early in the morning."

"You know you can't sweet talk me, Connie. You should be pleased I'm here to support your artist."

"And I am. What do you think of our Aubrey?

"I've only just got here, but what I've seen of him so far is impressive." She grinned at Aubrey, who smiled sheepishly, and continued pulling on a pair of pants.

"Well, be gentle with him, Jane. He's no Miguel. You can inform the public that Aubrey's work will feature in an upcoming show at my gallery."

"And when might that be?" She was well used to throwaway promotion.

"Next week, of course. We have to capture the momentum of the Pitman win, don't we?"

* * *

"I've always loved water." One of Aubrey's slim shoulders dipped and he looked down as if genuflecting on a childhood secret. When he looked up he wore a joyful grin. "The way it bubbles and flows." His hands rose with fingers as twisting spouts, and he raised his eyebrows and told her directly. "The way it feels on the skin, through your hair, even quenching your thirst. Water is marvelous stuff."

"Hmm, most would agree. But it is rather common place."

He snorted. "Like clean air." Aubrey sucked on his lip as if he regretted being so abrupt. "I never used to value water. Like I said, it was a plaything for me. I never took it seriously."

They stood in front of one of his new larger works. A painting of what might have been rolling slopes of endless wheat fields except each stalk was composed with the clarity of water. In another, a herd of crystal beef cattle flowed about a landscape reflected in a similar way.

"And when did you start taking it seriously?"

"It was something Constantine said about looking deeper."

"Constantine?" This truly surprised her. She had long suspected the only inspiration living in Constantine's bones was directed towards monetary gain.

"I began to understand it is not just how water appears, but also what it means. You are right. It is common place. We are ninety-eight percent water, and everybody knows it. And they know that all life depends on water. Nobody thinks about it, any more than they think about the air. We pollute it, and waste it as though there is a never-ending supply."

"So the paintings . . . are making a statement?"

"It takes about fifteen hundred litres of water to produce one kilo of wheat, and it takes 10 times more to produce one kilo of beef. Ten thousand litres to make a pair of jeans."

Jane lowered her head. She considered the prosaic treatment of the message and a relationship with banner art or propaganda, but looking up and moving on to the next painting dispelled that concern. The treatment was simple and beautiful. A series of footprints, like lakes, mirrors of the sky, led the eye through a landscape increasingly bereft of life until they dissolved in sand on the face of a mountain. Her shoulders slumped as the startling real sadness provoked by the image affected her.

"Do you like them, Jane?"

"This one is quite wonderful, I think, Aubrey. Very well done."

"Oh, thank you. It took me ages to get it the way I wanted it. That pleased me, you know."

She smiled and nodded. Jane liked Aubrey - he was transparent.

* * *

Miguel opened the Herald, and tore through pages until he found the Arts Review. After speaking to Jane Doyalson on the night, he expected a glowing assessment of his new pieces. His creative spirit, born of the fire of oppression and childhood neglect, of desire to surface above the dull crust of the life he was born to, scorched and scarred his canvases with meaning and unfathomable depth, that had resonated within all who saw them, as he had told Jane. In every one, his duende manifested strong and powerful. But there was no review. The section had been replaced by an item about Aubrey Jones winning the annual Pitman Prize. There was a small picture of the winning entry. Angel of the Falls said the title, and there was a waterfall over a craggy outcrop, but as he looked closer at the three column spread, he saw in three-quarter profile a visage, as if standing in a particular place and viewing the falls one would see the face, which would otherwise remain invisible. Despite it being only a photograph he was infected by the image. Cabr. Que te folle un pez!

He gritted his teeth and lifted the paper to read the article.

`Out of twelve finalists, the winning painting, titled `Angel of the Falls' by Aubrey Jones is an elusive portrait of fellow artist and friend, Miguel DeCorbus. . . '

As he recoiled, his stool at the bench slipped out from under him, and he was cast across the room onto the tiles. Late afternoon, he regained consciousness, with a mind to kill.

* * *

In the backroom, Constantine heard the double front doors smash into the stoppers, and knew who it was before his name was bellowed through the gallery.

"CONSTANTINE!"

Constantine wiped the prickle of sweat from his forehead with his handkerchief and loosened his collar, aware that if he didn't emerge, DeCorbus would come looking for him and he didn't like confrontations in small spaces.

"CONSTANTINE! Where are you, you weasel?"

Constantine knew that the longer he delayed, the more enraged the Spaniard would be. Fixing a smile on his face and throwing his shoulders back and his stomach out, he pushed open the swing door to the main gallery. As soon as DeCorbus saw him, his eyes went wild and he rushed at him. Constantine extended his arms and held up both his hands to fend him off.

"It is well you hide, cona."

"Miguel, Miguel calm down. What is the matter?"

"THIS. This." DeCorbus brandishing the folded Herald, evaded Constantine's arms and slapped him back and forth across the face. "Don't pretend you don't know."

To subdue DeCorbus and reinforce his position of absolute ignorance, Constantine grabbed the paper and opening it, studiously read the review, while keeping an eye on DeCorbus pacing back and forth, pounding the air with his fists.

"He has doused me, where are the flames and fire that is DeCorbus. Drowned under aqua!" He spat on the floor.

Constantine shivered in disgust. "I've asked you not to do that. I don't know what you are complaining about. He has immortalised your image in a winner of the Pitman."

"I'll kill him!" DeCorbus bent over and strangled an airy Aubrey with all his might so that the veins on his neck and arms swelled.

"Well, don't kill him yet. He hasn't produced enough paintings. I have to maintain interest - have enough to spread, then there is also turnover to consider."

All the more reason to. "Can you hear yourself? You low capitalist scum. You promised me four weeks, and now you cut me off for aqua boy!"

"You've had two weeks, Miguel and you will have one week more. You are only losing a week's showing."

DeCorbus continued to pace across the gallery, from his Purgatorial to Exploding Rock. "I would rather die, than see that piss-weak Aubrey eclipse me!"

"This is all flash in the pan, Miguel," ventured Constantine. "You are taking him too seriously. Remember when you won the Wellcroft Award, and I cut short Miles Sandland's showing to exhibit you?"

DeCorbus stopped long enough in his traverse to give him a curdled look.

"And where is Miles Sandland now? Gone, disappeared - never to be heard of again. But you. You are gold amongst the dross. I am a businessman, Miguel, I'll admit it, and to survive I have to make at times unpalatable decisions. But do you think I would take down an artist such as yourself, and a successful exhibit, if I didn't think I could reinstate it. Immediately, Jones' feeble production is dispensed with."

A less volatile, nay expatiated DeCorbus walked over to him.

"Miguel." Constantine bravely put his hand on the still shaking DeCorbus. "You my good fellow, are one in a million. I have seen a lot of art in my days." Constantine dipped his head to catch Miguel's eyes. "And you have to be the most talented and original artist I have ever handled."

"You did believe in me." murmured DeCorbus.

"And I still do. How many times have I shown your works? Three solo shows, never mind the collective exhibitions." Constantine placed his other hand on the other shoulder and shook the artist. "Well?"

DeCorbus bowed his head. "It is true."

"Yes, so calm down. This fuss over Aubrey Jones will be over soon. And you Miguel, unlike him, are an established artist. You have already a reputation that cannot die."

DeCorbus lifted Constantine's hands from his shoulders and moved towards the door. "I am sorry, my friend. For the insults . . ." He shook his head. "My behavior was inexcusable."

"I excuse you, Miguel. Only death separates the artist from his passion."

DeCorbus raised a hand in goodbye and walked out the door.

Damn artists. Did they think it was easy being a gallery owner, that there was no art in being an art dealer? Juggling the practicalities of showing, with business requirements, and dealing with the temperaments of self-absorbed artists, and their pretentions, their delusions, their endless dreams - oh their dreams. Cultivating the collectors, smooching them, complementing them, leading them into a conspiracy of his own making most times. And out of this mish-mosh of futility and the grandiose he had to trust his senses, take a punt on what he considered good and marketable, as well as original and new. And despite the demands of interior decorators he had to be bold and take risks. Otherwise someone like DeCorbus wouldn't have made it off the street corner. At least Aubrey kept a civil tongue in his head.

* * *

DeCorbus purchased a copy of the Herald from the newsstand, rolled it up and slipped it under his arm. He would not read the review now, no matter how much he wanted to bask in each wonderful word. Aubrey's show, ending on Thursday, had been moderately successful according to Constantine, though conceding he had to drop the price on several pieces.

Envy and jealousy had been strangers to him, he realized, due to his unwavering self-confidence. Belief that he, DeCorbus, was the best, and it was his passion for his art, for which he owed his success. Duende was alive and burning within. He did not have the ability to rationally disconnect from his passion, and where evidence of the rational arose, he incinerated it to ash in his work.

Jane promised her review of his work would appear the week prior to Aubrey's closing, and the re-instatement of his works at Constantine Galleries. He wanted to savor the article over a cup of freshly brewed espresso at his favorite cafe.

Strangely, he could not find the Arts Review section in the paper, and became worried, but then noticed a banner for the Lifestyle Supplement - `Hot Art This Weekend' and Jane's signature slashed across it. He flipped through the paper tearing pages until he found the supplement. What was no more than an illustrated list of six or seven gallery showings with a small description, ran down the page. The exception being the first featured in the list, which took up a third of the page. `If you want to dip into the Sydney Art this weekend we suggest you start at Constantine's Galleries, where water maestro and recent Pitman Prize winner Aubrey Jones wonderful water water-colours are amazing'. The article regurgitated excerpts from the previous review.

DeCorbus tore the paper to shreds and picked up his espresso and hurled it across the cafe at the counter.

"What the fuck? Miguel?" Mike the barista shouted over the hissing machine, only to see Miguel upset a table and chair and charge out the door.

* * *

`An extraordinary watercolour talent', `master of the medium', `true fluid symbolism', `quench the fevered thirst of the observer' - the glowing phrases rang in his skull like cursed bells. Pasty-faced, passionless no-talent gringo!

Miguel couldn't get through to Jane, but was transferred to the sub-editor.

"Oh, well, the Supplement Editor wanted a general culture piece because of the Arts Festival weekend. So we had to bump the review. Maybe you'll see it next week. I'll tell Jane you called."

DeCorbus's anger pumped within him like lava in the pipe of a stymied volcano. His forehead coursed vermillion with hot blood. The mountain he had been building, high for all to see, was melting. He grabbed the neck of the whiskey bottle and took a couple of swigs.

Constantine was spending more time with Aubrey than him. Stealing his niche, in more ways than one. Getting cozy with Jane - cabron. At other galleries he approached, he gained the impression they saw him as a passcontemporary of Aubrey - Why can't you paint more like him? Give us something new. Fashion in art might pass on, but he still had a faithful band of collectors, undaunted by his rising prices, despite one bankrupt, and another pursuing antiques. But they were also Constantine's clients weren't they? He took another belt of whisky. And Constantine could talk butter out of a fry pan.

He eyed his medium expediently, and recalled a conversation with Aubrey, and raising the subject of Dali's serpentine paint, not entirely in jest. Dali was right, it did provide a finer line. There was only one way to surpass, the hack's success and fame. What did Constantine say - `...he hasn't done enough paintings'?- Exactly!

Miguel drew in the cool, fresh night air and sighed at the twinkling firmament above the up lit trees. The path led out across the park and he followed it at a steady gait. Up in that great vault of heaven God was looking down on him, knowing his destiny. He fingered the smooth glass jar in his hand.

* * *

At the graveside Aubrey stood between Constantine and Jane. Dodging about behind and around them were photographers and two or three film crews, constrained only by the Catholic priest's disapproving glare, all craning to get shots and footage of DeCorbus's model ex-wife and celebrity entourage on the other side of the grave.

"It is so sad," said Jane. "He was always so alive, so vibrant."

"A brilliant fire, consumed by itself," intoned Constantine.

"I think his work was in a bit of a lull, but that he was going to take up some new direction. Renew himself, re-invent himself, if you know what I mean," said Jane, and dipped her nose into her handkerchief.

"I think he may have already started on something new," said Constantine. "The Coroner attributes his death to the presence of neurotoxins in his system. The toxicology report revealed that the paint he was holding contained what they believe may have been snake venom.

"Just as well he didn't get to give it to me," said Aubrey. "He must have forgot my habit of putting the wrong end of the brush in my mouth. I might have been killed, very sick at least."

"Yes," said Constantine, turning one eyebrow up, and the other down. " It must have slipped his mind. Lucky you."

"Fuck the sheep!" said Aubrey.

"What?" asked Constantine, and Jane gave him a dirty look.

"Oh, just something Miguel once told me," he explained. "He also said, he wanted to create every moment he was alive."

"Well, he got that wish," said Constantine. "He has now entered the pantheon of dead artists."

* * *

Constantine opened the door to his back storeroom and surveyed the stacked canvases by DeCorbus. With those paintings taken down from the most recent show, and the new additions secured from his apartment studio, he estimated there were close to a hundred and thirty paintings in his possession. There is something to be said for artistic ethos. Contemplating the potential of the goldmine threatened to overwhelm him. He breathed deep and wiped his forehead with his white handkerchief. "It is better this way."

His smile broadened into a grin. At the end of the room stacked on a pallet was the cherry on the cake, the ultimate DeCorbus. He persuaded the Detective Inspector to keep the police tape surrounding the death scene until he made arrangements. He thrust out his bottom lip. The pavement slabs were removed easily enough with a bobcat and a harness. The Council were more than amenable, once it was known replacement pavement would be provided.

Since execution, the blood had turned to a dark brownish black and the various masses of it, reflective. Where the blood mixed with the blue paint, a more variegated effect had been achieved in shades of purple and strangely enough, red. He intended to wait until the three slabs were mounted as a triptych, and he could once again regard the work as a whole, before naming it, which he believed his right. As he recalled, a substantial part displayed figurative attempt, most likely prior to the toxins taking effect and his movements becoming erratic or out of his control. It occurred to him, some quarters might regard the naming of a dead artist's last work, a terrible responsibility - chief among which would be answering the question 'what was the artist trying to say?'

Being the last painting, and given the circumstances of its inception, the inclusion of a message might be considered. Normally, however, such an idea would be a baseless distraction. One might as well name a painting by what it depicted, or what it was - in this case, `The Last Creation of DeCorbus'.

* * *

Constantine's Gallery closed for a month, reportedly out of respect. Constantine intended to throw open the doors in a grand re-opening to celebrate the newly renovated interior and the memory of a great artist, DeCorbus. Both Jane and Aubrey received an invitation to a private showing prior to opening night.

Aubrey couldn't see much physical change to the gallery interior, with the exception of a new coat of paint. Hanging widely spaced on the walls were a selection of sixteen or so of Miguel's paintings, based around a loose theme. Aubrey conjectured that Constantine intended to drip feed the collection to the market so as to elevate prices.

"This way." Constantine scooted ahead of them on his tiny feet, leading them joyously through a chicane of partitions to a large open space at the end of the gallery. Against the far wall a large cream tent, normally seen in desert Bedouin camps, had been erected.

Constantine beamed at their mystified looks. "The pie de ristance."

"Please." He waved them towards the entrance.

Aubrey held the tent flap open for Jane. The interior lighting was diffused with a pinkish tint due to the red carpet underfoot. The far wall of the tent was showered with spotlights illuminating three concrete slabs linked vertically in a black metal framework.

Aubrey was shocked and took a step back, and saw Jane beside him react the same way. There was Miguel, but not so much Miguel, as the exposed traces of his inner fire, now isolated to form the intrinsic demon being. In those last fevered black scrawls, puddles and swathes of paint across raw concrete an evil entity arose born of his blood and exiting creative spirit. Every part of it, every ripple, scratch and smear playing a sinister ambiguous game, where once the eye had been caught, the soul was infected by a new darkness. Aubrey's eyes nictitated, recognitive assaults to his mind were unremitting, a cold perspiration broke out all over him and he shook uncontrollably. Jane, shaking and crying averted her eyes and saw Aubrey turn, take a few steps and throw himself out through the entrance of the tent. She ran out after him. Emerging from the tent everything changed in some indefinable way, everything appeared the same, but only that.

Lying at Constantine's feet, Aubrey struggled against the spasms coursing through his body. Jane knelt and wrapped her arms around him. She rubbed his upper arms and his tremors quelled. Aubrey looked up at Constantine.

"You rotten bastard, Constantine. You can't show it. No fucking way, prick."

"Now, now Aubrey, that doesn't sound like you. It is an impressive work, dare I say, influential. It will affect viewers in different ways. Not all as profoundly as you, my artist friend."

Jane helped Aubrey to his feet, but hung on his arm much as supported him. In her prolonged blank stare lived an inescapable, incomprehensible vision. "I was scared."

"You can't, Constantine." Aubrey slumped, as the thought of rampant exposure to others spread, and the pain that would ensue, overtook him. "It is bad, evil, wrong."

"Wrong? To share DeCorbus' genius. Now, that would be unfair, wouldn't it?"

Like a blind woman Jane had to abandon her grip as Aubrey leapt at Constantine. He grabbed Constantine by the lapels of his suit and slammed his bulk against the wall.

"You won't show it, Constantine, you can't." Aubrey tightened his grip and pushed his fists into the dealer's chest.

"Can't, won't? Who do you think you are? As DeCorbus might have said ` me cago en Dios' - I shit on God"

Aubrey's hands moved to Constantine's throat and smashed his head into the wall.

"Don't get hot under the collar, Aubree. What am I saying? Look at yourself. You should be thanking me."

"I'll kill you first."

Tugging on his arm diverted his attention to a pale, frightened Jane beside him.

Aubrey drew Constantine's face close into his. "YOU KNOW WHAT IT IS?"

"Duende." Constantine smiled, and his eyes appeared to float in their sockets.