Perfect summer

 

June 16, 2021

Perfect summer day. An unexpected bout of housecleaning led me to the antique stores, looking for a book case. Found nothing. Wandered into the Candle Station to look at art. Met an exuberant artist named O who literally plucked me from the hall to look at his paintings. He was personable, enthusiastic, and very ambitious. The piece he has priced $1,000,000 sat swathed in plastic, but he showed me pictures of it. He was readying himself for a visit this evening from a local gallery which may want to feature his work. The paintings are muddy abstracts with some figures showing through– a textile-referencing style apparently obligatory for the African-American artist-- and worth about 1/10 of what he’s priced them, but his personal attractiveness and enthusiasm may make up the difference. He admitted that the million dollar painting was to “set a mood.” I might have taken it had he given it to me. The piece he identified as “the first work I did when I came to Asheville” was by far the best, clean, rhythmic, Pollock-y. I might have bought it except that it was too big and heavy for me to hang. I shared with him that fact that the entire second floor, where 60 or more artists now have their workshops, was once occupied solely by me, when Urthona and Black Swan and various other activities were all going concerns, and I tried to keep everything in play. He said, “I heard of that person! I can’t believe I’m meeting you!”