32. Kieran
KIERAN
Two days before Christmas, I have to go to Burlington on our day off. The art school dean wants to give me an interview and a portfolio review before they decide on my application.
So I’m scowling in front of my closet, wondering what the hell a guy wears to something like that. And wondering if I own it.
“Is something wrong?” Roderick asks, entering the room. “You just made a grumpy noise.”
I pluck a white shirt out of the closet. “Is this my nicest button down? You don’t think I’m supposed to wear a tie do you?”
“No tie,” he says lightly, taking the shirt from my hand and holding it up to the light. “This one is fine. But it isn’t the one I’d choose.”
I take a step back from the closet and close my eyes, like a man condemned. “This is why I was just going to audit a class or two. I never asked to be interviewed , for fuck’s sake. Or to submit a portfolio.”
“It was a terrific portfolio,” Rod says, flipping through my shirts.
“But this isn’t just about learning now,” I argue. “It’s paying people to judge me.”
“That’s one take on it.” Rod laughs. “There’s a reason nobody uses that as a university slogan.”
“Am I a better person if I get a diploma on a piece of paper?”
“No.” Rod pulls a shirt from the closet. It’s white, with a conservative navy-blue check running through it. “If this fits you, wear this with dark jeans. And tuck it in.”
“Jeans?”
“This is Vermont. And nobody is trying to make you into someone you’re not, Kieran. The only point of this exercise is to get half price on courses that you already want to take.”
“I hate interviews,” I grumble, pulling on the shirt.
“You don’t say.” He snickers. “It isn’t a parole hearing, honey. Go in there and smile at the nice lady so she’ll give you money for art school.”
“Parole hearing.” I snort, reaching for my dark jeans. “You have first-hand experience with those?”
“No, but the day is young. Now quit whining and get out of here. You look hot in that shirt, by the way. Be a good boy, and I’ll take it off you later.”
That’s as good a motivation as any. So I go. Reluctantly.
Things start off pretty well with the interviewer.
Dean Eloise Rubinstein is a comfortable-looking woman in her mid-sixties.
Rod would probably compliment her earrings and chat her up about the art on the walls of her office.
But I’m intimidated by the abstract art on the walls and the grand office overlooking the sculpture garden.
“So tell me, Kieran, why do you want to go to art school?”
I’ve been expecting this question. But that doesn’t mean I have a satisfying answer. “Well, that’s the thing. I never did apply to art school. You basically talked me into it.”
She laughs, which is a good sign, I guess. “Yet, here you are. So how exactly did we arrive here?”
“Right. Well, I’ve been taking online classes in design. I never tried to become the next great artist. That’s not how I look at my designs. But I enjoy making things, and I’d like to make better things. And—if it’s possible—I would like to find a way to make a living at it.”
She nods encouragingly.
The rest comes out in a rush. “So that’s why I thought I’d audit some classes. Because you guys know things that I don’t.”
“See, that’s actually a pretty good attitude for starting an art program. And there are more people than you can shake a stick at making a living from their art, either directly or indirectly.”
“That’s good news.”
“When did you first realize you cared about the visual arts?” she asks.
“Oh, I was just that kid who was always drawing,” I tell her.
“Teachers liked it. They used to tell me I was creative and put my drawings in the middle of the bulletin board. But when I hit my teen years, I stopped drawing in public. I got the message that art wasn’t a cool thing for boys to do.
And I didn’t take any art classes for a really long time. ”
She flinches. “You’re not the first person to sit in this office who had that experience. I worry about all the boys—and girls—who are told not to express themselves this way. So what got you started again?”
“Farming,” I say with a chuckle. “My parents needed to list some products for sale from our website. My mother asked me if I could design something that looked professional. So I started noodling with designs. My younger cousin does the art for his family farm, too, and he introduced me to Photoshop. I liked it so much that I dove right in.”
“What did you like about it?”
“I liked how practical it was,” I admit. “If you make a mistake in paint, it can be hard to fix. But Photoshop lets you undo anything. Copy anything. Try anything. The result is a little less interesting than a painting or a drawing. But I guess I’m an awfully practical guy.”
She beams.
“And one day I wondered if I could make extra money doing this fun thing that I’d taken up as a hobby.
So I typed ‘Photoshop’ into a jobs board.
That’s how I lucked into a design-rendering job at an ad agency.
They didn’t care that I have no formal training.
They thought it was a plus, honestly, because they pay me almost nothing, and I’m still happy to show up every day. ”
“Ah,” she says with a sad smile. “Many young artists are familiar with the problem.”
“Sure. So I’ve made a lot of digital art for them.
But I also started painting at home when I have free time.
Which is almost never, especially during the holidays.
There’s no daylight when I’m home from the ad agency, and there’s been a lot of overtime in the last month.
That’s why none of my paintings made it into the portfolio I sent you. ”
“Okay. And the work in your portfolio was mostly done at the ad agency?” she asks.
“Exactly. I made a lot of notes so you could tell what was mine and what I’d been given to work with.” God, it’s probably the weirdest portfolio she’s ever received. But I only had ten days to pull something together.
“I read your notes,” she said slowly. “But maybe you can talk me through how you put one of your pieces together. I like to hear how artists think.”
“Well, I’ll try.” I let out a nervous laugh. I’m sweating, and I hope she can’t tell.
The dean opens my portfolio—which is really just a binder from Staples—to a poster I did for the Farmers’ Market Association. “This is my favorite piece. Can you tell me where you got the inspiration?”
“Well, sure.” I clear my throat. “As I wrote in my note, this was the one time they barely gave me any instructions. The boss basically said, ‘You come from a family of farmers. Just see what you can come up with.’”
She smiles. “Are you related to the Shipleys who make cider? That’s your family, too?”
My body flashes hot and then cold again, the way it often does when I get this question. “That’s one side of the family. They raise apples and dairy. We raise beef. So I’ve spent a lot of time at farmers’ markets.”
“And how did you choose this design?”
I look down at my drawing of a red, vintage pickup truck carrying produce.
“Well, the first design I made had a purple beet filling the page, with stylized text stacked inside it. It was very bright and contemporary, and I loved it. But the boss said he wanted more variety. It can’t represent just one farmer, you know? ”
“Sure,” she says mildly.
“My grandpa once drove a truck just like this one,” I say, pointing at the drawing.
“His was black, but it had those curvy vintage wheel wells. I used to sit on the tailgate with him while my grandma sold apples. The truck had a lot of farmers’ market cred.
And, in the drawing, the truck bed gave me a place to stack some more imagery.
” There’s lots of produce in back, but the sizes aren’t true-to-life.
There’s an enormous melon, a freakishly large ear of corn, an elephantine tomato, and a towering carrot.
“I was thinking about those colorful French posters while I drew it. So I gave it a vintage text treatment, too.”
“Lovely,” she says. “And the logo? I like how the spade and the pitchfork are crossed, like a knife and fork.”
“Yeah, I like it too. But that’s not my work. I said so in my note.”
“Mmh,” she says. “So I have another question for you, and it’s a little difficult.
But just bear with me a second, okay? I received another portfolio, with some overlapping elements.
” She pulls out a leather folio and flips it open to a page that’s marked with a sticky note. Then she turns it toward me.
For a moment, I’m super confused. It’s a drawing of a hot-air balloon I did for a festival in Quechee last June. But someone added textured effects to each of the balloon segments. The result is hideous. “What the?—?”
But even as the words are leaving my mouth, I realize that I already know who did this.
And I’m so aggravated that I stand up suddenly, causing my chair to jerk back a few inches.
Feeling like a brute, I sit down just as quickly.
Then I take a deep breath and try to speak through my anger.
“I sure hope there was a note in that portfolio, too, explaining who drew the balloon before it was attacked by clipart patterns.”
Slowly, the dean shakes her head.
I tilt my head back and let out a heavy sigh. I can’t believe Deacon Pratt took that balloon, gave it a nasty makeover and submitted it as his own. I can’t believe he even wants to go to art school.
Working for the Pratts really is a dead-end job. And—insult to injury—this means my asshole father was right.
“Kieran,” the dean says. “Why don’t you tell me about the version in your portfolio.”
“Sure,” I say woodenly. “I drew the version in my portfolio. It’s in there because I wanted to include something I’d done in ink on paper.
They wanted it to look handmade, so I freehanded it.
But you can see it’s not the best.” I feel deflated, though.
This woman is probably suspicious of everything coming out of the Pratt Agency now.
I hate my life.
“I liked your version better,” she says gently. “I suppose you can guess where this other one came from.”
“Sure.” My voice is flat. “There aren’t that many suspects.”
“Well, I’m sorry to have brought it up. But I needed to know why I received two very similar portfolios.”
I sit up a little straighter in my chair. “Are there more like this?”
She nabs the other portfolio off the table and sets it on the floor on her side of the desk. “Yes. But I’m not going to show you. It will only make you angry. It’s obvious who is coming up with the ideas, and who is just tarting them up.”
A wave of nausea rolls through me. “Crap. This isn’t how I wanted this interview to go,” I say in a rare burst of candidness.
“I bet. But take a deep breath, okay? You did a nice job explaining your process to me. And I’ve been admiring that farmers’ market poster for two years now.”
“Yeah?” I smile in spite of myself.
“Of course. It’s cheery. And now I’ve met the artist, so I like it even more.
” She flips my portfolio closed, then hands it to me.
“It was a pleasure meeting you, Kieran. In a couple of days, you’ll receive notification about your application.
But if you’re accepted, your financial aid award won’t arrive for another couple of weeks, okay?
I’m asking the financial aid office to squeeze in your application, even though it’s past the deadline. I hope that works.”
“Me too,” I say. “And thank you.” I stand up and shake her hand. I make all the right polite noises.
But if that financial aid doesn’t come through, this was a waste of time.
“How’d it go ?” is how Roddy answers his phone.
“It went okay,” I say, staring up at an impossibly blue sky. “If they take me, I’m going to go.”
“Yaaaas!” he thunders into my ear. “This is so exciting.”
I smile, because his voice makes me happy. I still don’t know if art school is the right choice for me. But if I get to go home to him every night, it might not matter. “I have to swing through Montpelier on the way home,” I tell him now. “What should I pick up for dinner?”
“Let’s make a lasagna.”
“Sounds good.” Cooking anything with Roddy is always good.
“Bring home a couple pounds of ground meat, a box of those flat noodles, and... Got a pen? I have big ideas.”
“How about you text your big ideas to me while I drive to the store?”
“An excellent idea, hunk. This is going to be great.”
I already know it’s true.