It was a full-mooned evening in Prague .
It was a wonderful year to be there.
“You know, our absinthe tastes better than the American
copies,” Perushka mentioned with nonchalance.
“We use the original recipe. It
is legal again here in the Republic.”
… It was the catacombs of Prague .
Right at the outskirts of the city, near an eclectic Italian outdoors
eatery and an office of metallurgical products.
It was where absinthe was now drunk, with all the appropriate ceremonies.
And, among the youth swarming between the passages of this
popular gathering place, we found friends we had made a few days ago.
“Ah the artist and his model!” And they made place at their
table.
“Will the Green Fairy be your host tonight?” I was asked.
Perushka knew better.
“He is the painter” she explained, “He cannot drink. But I will.
It may make me a better model!”
… It was a lazy Saturday.
Sitting in the front yard of a church I was watching the very European
attitude of not being surprised by life folks had in the street. A few hundred meters away were the tramway
lines. After watching a few tramway
shifts, I concluded that they seem quite punctual.
“What are you doing now?’
It was Perushka on my portable phone.
“Watching the tramways in front of the church.”
“These are old Russian wagons, you know? We have put a lot of new makeup on them and
now they look nostalgic. A bit like me,
this morning.”
Her voice did not sound right.
“Oh, it is the Green Fairy from last night,” she guessed
about my silence. “We stayed there much passed the time you left.”
And without waiting for my comment she added “Can you come
and see me? I have something to show
you.”
She lived on the fifth floor of a building noticeably built
during a different era. The stairways
smelled of concrete and moisture. By the
fourth floor I was feeling my legs.
“Hello friend,” she said before the door was fully
open. “Would you like a coffee?”
The view from her apartment was charming, though. Prague
has a way of becoming very romantic if watched secretively.
“So, what do you want to show me?”
“Me, as you have never seen!!”
And I felt the apartment walls getting narrower,
suddenly. And Prague being watched more secretively.
She went to her bedroom, and came back with a canvas. It was my favorite working size frame, 56 by
34 cm, Facilis Averno #4, stretched over a common pine wood frame.
“Here, Painter. Here
is what the Green Fairy showed me last night.”
It was a self portrait.
And it was unexpectedly telling!
There was Perushka, seemingly naked, looking at herself in a
mirror. I immediately recognized the
dark mask upon her face--it was an exaggeration of the de-silvered part of her
bedroom mirror. It was transposed, it
was reshaped, but it was borrowed from her reality.
I could see only one eye, although I felt that the painting
was looking at me with both eyes.
“You like?”
I did not want to answer yet. Something was intriguing me.
“Did you see yourself like this, or was this who you were
told you were last night?”
Perushka smiled the smile Eastern Europeans have when they
light a Lucky Strike while looking at you with one eye.
“What difference does it make?”
… I continued looking at the canvas. Her face was unevenly
shaped. Her one eye and front were just
enough larger than her cheek bones. That
made me uneasy.
“Did you see yourself in pieces then put the pieces
together? You look like a puzzle.”
“And do you like puzzles?”
“Only if I can solve most of them,” I assured.
“Very smart, Mister Painter”, she laughed and then coughed
for a short while. “All I need to know is if you have seen me like this
before.”
It was a tempting question.
I was tempted to answer. But I
did not.
“I have seen you totally detached from yourself, bored when
I start sketching before painting you. I
have seen you with lips like the ones you drew but never with an eye
penetrating soo deeply. But what I want
to see is what you have covered with that strange Mardi Gras mask—did you not
see it last night or what you saw should have been covered?”
Perushka did not look at me.
She slowly drew upon the Lucky Strike, and with the sang-froid of a
Ninja Master said:
“Painter, what you do not see is still there. If you wanted to see it you did not need my
painting to show it to you.”
Then she walked toward the window. She looked out for a long while. Prague
is also attractive that way.
“Have you used a MIR
camera before? It means peace, you know.”
“An Armenian using a Ukrainian rangefinder to photograph a
Czech model?”
The camera had that typical smell of Former Soviet Union
optical tools—the characteristic mix of lubricant, leather and mold.
The front element of the lens was cracked and some sort of
polish added in spots. But it did not
seem to be an accidental damage. It had
a pattern, it had a goal.
“Do not tell me the Green Fairy did this!” I joked.
“May be. What is
important is that I want you to take a picture of me with this camera. But here is the condition—you have to figure
out how to use the lens to get the exact same effect as my painting. Can you?”
“You want me to rediscover you as you put it down on canvas?
And do so given the expected specific distortions and soft-focus areas given this broken lens on
a 1954 Ukrainian camera?”
“It is from 1957. Can
you?”
It was a unique moment.
A rangefinder not being a thru-the-lens camera, I could see clearly in
the viewfinder. Yet I knew the lens
would allow in broken and distorted light only.
And the polish would soften and darken some areas.
“How many times am I allowed to click?”
“Three times—that is how long I allow men to be with me
after a night with the Green Fairy.”
She inhaled deeply on the Lucky Strike. Then she looked at
me slowly exhaling the blue smoke, and creating a momentary veil to her face. I
clicked and rewound. Three times.
“Well done, Painter.
Now, I will send you one printed picture in a few days. It will be the one I chose as the one that
defines your skill. I may decide to use it someday. Go now.”
…. I found a small package at my apartment door two days later. I rushed in, but did not want to
tear the brown wrapping impulsively. I
knew there was a picture of Perushka in there, captured by a tortured
lens. A lens that let in light in unexpected
ways. Light reflected by a tortured
person.
I took my shoes off, pushed the window panels wide, and opened
the package. There was a short note
attached to a Black & White picture.
“My dear Armenian poet
We may never work
together again, and I have to tell you that it was a good experience for me to
have known you. You are a better poet
than a painter, and I will meet other painters, I know. Some will try to paint in artificial
light. Some will even share the Green
Fairy with me. But not many will do what
you did with that broken lens. I will
tell you, Poet, what you did: you
trusted the broken light because you trust light. You did not take a picture of me, but you
collected light from a broken person. I thought love was the rider who breaks
us all. Now I see it is also trust.
You got your puzzle,
Armenian man. Now you have to put it together alone."
Eventually Yours
Perushka
Sometime in 2009
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