2019
Juliet was standing in the gallery of Phillips auctioneers at the north end of Berkeley Square, staring at a painting she was thinking of buying. She bought her art from auction houses because she found the galleries that showed the kind of contemporary work she liked a bit intimidating. And she’d had a bad experience with one of the gallerists.
What a pest he’d been, pursuing her relentlessly for her business once he’d found out who she was – and then more personally. Yuck.
‘Do you like this picture?’ said a man’s voice suddenly, near her.
She glanced to her left to see who was there, assuming the remark had been addressed to someone else, but there was just her and a man, a bit older than her, quite tall, black hair.
She didn’t answer. She knew all the opening gambits and she really couldn’t be bothered. This was her happy time, indulging in her private pleasure of looking at works of art and sometimes buying them. She wasn’t there to make friends. Or get picked up.
So she ignored him and carried on staring at the painting, although her happy contemplation was now infected with a prickle of irritation that this man hadn’t got the message and moved on.
‘I thought I liked it,’ he said, looking at the artwork, not at her. ‘I really respond to the colours, they are jewel-like and satisfying and the paint surface has an appealing silky texture, but the more I look, the more I see how derivative it is of Rothko. I didn’t see it at first, because the strips of colour are narrow and his are wide, but the way the paint fades out at the edges is just too similar.’
It was almost as though the painting changed in front of Juliet’s eyes as he spoke. What had seemed rich and alluring – and just right for her inner hallway – did somehow now look like a bad version of Rothko. It was like wrapping paper: visually appealing but no real depth.
Without thinking, she turned to look at the man again. At the same moment, he glanced over at her, smiled broadly and walked off.
Heading deliberately in the opposite direction – which meant going back past paintings she’d already looked at, another irritation – Juliet continued her tour of the preview, but she couldn’t quite lose herself in it as she normally did. She kept wondering what that man might say about each painting she was looking at. But she pressed on. This auction of late twentieth-century British works was one she had been particularly looking forward to.
Eventually, she came to a work that engaged her properly. She already had a small piece by the same artist that she loved and didn’t know she’d also done large pieces like this. Like the painting Juliet owned, it was abstract, but with discernible objects in it, which was what she liked so much. It was as though there was a story in there, if you could only figure it out.
She glanced at the catalogue she was holding and found the entry for it. The estimate was right in the sweet spot for her, the mid-five figures. She turned down the corner of the page and carried on looking at the painting.
She didn’t know how long she’d been standing there when she became aware of someone next to her. It was the same guy. The black hair, messy curls. He was smiling at the canvas, nodding slowly.
‘Beautiful,’ he said. ‘Just beautiful.’
‘Do you think so?’ she asked, in spite of herself. It broke all her rules about not engaging with men like this, but after what he’d said about the last picture, she genuinely wanted to know what he thought of this one. Annoying though that was.
‘Yes. Do you like it?’
‘I do. Very much. I already own a small picture by this artist and I’m thinking to bid on this one.’
She saw one of his eyebrows go up just enough to make her curse herself. Why had she said that?
‘I don’t think you’ll regret it,’ he said. ‘I own a few of her paintings myself.’
And smiling again, he’d tipped an imaginary hat and walked off.