Guns in the Gallery

‘If you’re talking about Facebook and Twitter, I’m—’

‘I’m not talking about them. You don’t have to go to those kinds of lengths. Google will be quite sufficient. You can find virtually everyone, and certainly anyone who’s trying to present some kind of public profile like Denzil Willoughby. Come on, bring your wine glass with you and we’ll check it out on my laptop upstairs.’

‘Carole, I thought the point of having a laptop was that it’s mobile.’

‘Sorry?’

‘You can use it anywhere. On the train, in a coffee shop, upstairs, downstairs.’

Carole Seddon’s face took on a bleak, old-fashioned look. ‘I prefer to use mine in the computer room,’ she said.

Jude sighed wearily, picked up her glass of Chilean Chardonnay and followed her neighbour out of the kitchen.

The ‘computer room’ was in fact Carole’s spare bedroom, very rarely used for its primary function. She almost never had people to stay, except of course for Stephen’s family, and even them she found something of a strain. A guilty feeling of relief came into her mind at the thought that Gaby and Lily would be staying elsewhere on their visit at the end of the month. Which reminded her, she must ring Fulham and report back on Walden. She didn’t really think it would be suitable for them. Fine for the Sam Torinos of this world, but maybe a bit too posh for Gaby . . . though of course she’s be far too discreet to say that to her daughter-in-law’s face.

She brought the laptop out of hibernation and googled Denzil Willoughby. There were, to her, a surprising number of references. Maybe his self-estimation was not so disproportionate to his fame as she had thought.

Carole homed in on the artist’s own website, whose home page contained, in her view, far too many four-letter words. As he had amply demonstrated at the Private View, his target audience was not genteel retired ladies in Fethering.

Links directed browsers to other parts of the website. There was a rather aggressive biography which certainly didn’t mention the shaming fact that he had been a public schoolboy at Lancing College. There were lists of galleries where he had exhibited, though interestingly the Cornelian Gallery was not among them. Whether this was because he thought Fethering too insignificant to mention, or whether he had removed the reference in a fit of pique after the early closing of his exhibition, it was impossible to know.

The website contained pages of photographs of Denzil Willoughby’s work. Guns were evidently a fairly recent preoccupation. Previous collections of work he’d done around the themes of famine, AIDS, tsunamis and the Rwandan genocide. Yet again, Carole Seddon didn’t see anything that she would have given houseroom to.

But the artworks were very definitely for sale. Though the website didn’t quote prices, there were links to Denzil Willoughby’s agent and a couple of galleries with whom he had deals to sell his work. And if he ever sold anything at the prices that had been quoted at the Cornelian Gallery Private View, then he could make quite a good living.

Another link on the website was entitled ‘Artist at Work’. When the two women got into it, all they could see was what appeared to be a dark interior of a huge room.

‘What’s he selling there?’ asked Carole cynically. ‘Space? Darkness? Air? No doubt, because the Great Denzil Willoughby had the concept of marketing such stuff, he can charge what he likes for it.’

‘I don’t think that is one of his artworks,’ said Jude. ‘I think it’s his workshop.’

‘Oh?’

‘And I think there’s a webcam on it permanently, so that members of the public can go online and watch the “Artist at Work”.’

‘What, watch him sticking photographs of black teenagers on to fibreglass guns?’

‘If that happens to be the creation of the moment, yes.’

‘What incredible arrogance! To assume that anyone would be interested in his work in progress. Artists used to work on their own and not show their work until they’d finished it.’

‘That’s not true of all artists, Carole. A lot of them used to treat their studios as a kind of salon, through which all and sundry could pass at will.’

‘Yes, but they were at least real artists.’

‘They “painted things that looked like things”?’

‘Exactly,’ replied Carole, unaware that she was being sent up.

‘Anyway,’ Jude went on, ‘I’m pretty sure that’s what’s happening. When Denzil Willoughby’s there in the workshop, the lights are on and we can watch the genius at work. But presumably neither the genius nor his assistants are working on a Saturday evening.’

‘Assistants?’ Carole repeated incredulously. ‘Why does he have assistants?’

‘Oh, to do the work for him. You don’t think he actually stuck those photographs on the gun himself, do you?’

‘Well, he must have done. If he’s claiming that it’s his work of art, the least he must’ve done is to make the thing.’

‘No, Carole,’ said Jude, an amused grin on her tired face. ‘He just had the concept of doing it.’

As she knew she would, her neighbour just said, ‘Huh.’