“Don’t worry, you don’t have to sit perfectly still.”
“Are you sure?”
asked Douglas Furnis. “I do want it to
look like me.”
“That shouldn’t be
a problem. But I’ve found while doing
live portraits that when the subject sits perfectly still, then some of the
life abandons the face”, Glen said.
“Well, I don’t want
that to happen.”
He had a handsome
face, one so beautifully made that for Glen it was almost an exquisite pain
being commissioned to do his portrait.
Still, he couldn’t understand the discomfort he felt in this person’s
presence. They were sitting in his
living room, which was all Danish Modern furniture, black, white, grey, and
taupe, clean lines, no clutter. An environment
so clean, ordered and sterile, as to suggest an underlying sinisterness. Like Douglas’ face? Glen had never had the dubious pleasure of
painting so beautiful, perfect and flawless a face, male or female. He had just learned from Greg, now Aaron, who
also did commissioned portraits, that one should really charge the highest fees
to the prettiest sitters. The terms
they had agreed on were indeed generous.
Along with the painting he had just purchased, Glen was guaranteed to
live comfortably for a while. The
silence in his apartment was almost tomb-like.
“I’ve never sat in
such a clean apartment”, he said.
“I have a very good
cleaning lady”, Douglas replied. “I’ve
had her for years. She’s Croatian. She used to bring her son with her, but he’s
gone off to university.” Glen had so far
established the ground colour of the painting: a deep rich and uniform
maroon. The face had already been shaped
in strokes of titanium white, chrome yellow and process magenta. This was not going to be an easy paint. There was something almost too perfect and
flawless about this face, and he was sure that there was also something
lacking. What was it? Glen was painting a mask? Had he had extensive plastic surgery? How could a nose be so perfectly formed? Glen didn’t paint perfection, but this
Douglas Furnis wanted a perfect representation.
This would be the first face he’d painted that didn’t appear to have
some underlying truth that was just waiting to be brought out in paint.
“Tell me a bit
about yourself, Doug.”
“You may call me
Douglas.”
“Sorry. Douglas.
But tell me about yourself, please.”
“Why?”
“When I’m doing a
live sitting, it often helps me bring out something real in the portrait.”
“I’m not interested
in that kind of ‘real’.”
“I’m just concerned
that I might turn out a plastic, sterile kind of representation.”
“That’s what I
want. It’ll go with the furniture.”
Glen almost
laughed, but immediately realized that Douglas was not joking. He gave him the creepy, oppressive impression
of someone who had never laughed in his life.
He couldn’t begin to guess his age.
If he had had recent plastic surgery then he might be as old as fifty,
though his hands suggested a man somewhere near thirty. Glen was too shy to ask.
“How long will this
take.”
“It might be a
couple of weeks. If you give me a couple
of good photos I can work with it might be done sooner.
“I prefer live
sittings.”
“You don’t mind?”
“I have lots of
time right now. I’m leaving my business
in the hands of my two partners for the time being. I’m thinking of travelling.”
“Where?”
“Costa Rica. Then maybe Thailand and Cambodia.” I try to go every year if I can.”
“How long have you
lived here in Vancouver?”
“Please, no more
personal questions.”
“But—”
“You are here to
paint.”
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