For Her Arts Sake Ch 01 02

Chapter 1

It was one of those Saturday mornings that I think we all absolutely hate to see; dark and blustery, with grey skies full of low scudding clouds - some of which were delivering bursts of wind-driven rain; causing anyone who had to be out in it, to utter oaths at its apparently quite personal spitefulness.

So I gave a silent sigh of relief that I'd actually had the call the previous lunch-time; from my regular golf partner, saying that he had a badly sprained wrist, and as he had been unable to find an alternate, had cancelled our booking at the club. Just the look of the weather outside quite convinced me that this Saturday was definitely not one that I personally would want to be playing golf.

But then of course I had to decide exactly what to actually do with this unexpected period of free time. I had a date with a woman I had been seeing for the last few months - for dinner, then a concert we were both looking forward to - but even allowing for the fact that I should change the bed sheets and do a bit of general tidying of my apartment, that still left me with several hours to make some use of.

I began by deciding to treat myself to a totally unhealthy breakfast - today was not a day for organic muesli, it was a day for a good old-fashioned fry-up; eggs, bacon, tomatoes - the lot piled on some bread, crisply fried in the bacon fat. '

Bugger the risk of heart or artery disease

!' I muttered under my breath as I first went to both, belatedly check my mail box, then scurry out to collect the week-end papers.

Just the smell and sound of the thick rashers of bacon frying made me feel very much better and when I sat down and began to tuck into the large plateful of absolutely unwholesome goodies I felt even more so - even thinking to myself that it was remarkable how simply breaking an admittedly self imposed rule can be such a turn-on.

By then the coffee had percolated, so as the unusually heavy breakfast had left me feeling rather more sluggish than was normal at that time of the day, as I sipped it I began slowly and leisurely working my way through what I brought up with me. Normally I would just briefly scan the paper, making a note of any article I might be interested in reading more thoroughly at a later time, and quickly dump most of the stuff in the mail box, but that Saturday was already completely different to most, so I read things I might normally have simply skipped straight past.

One of those was a flyer announcing the opening of a new exhibition at an Art Gallery - not something that generally might have caught my eye. But several things prompted me to a second look.

For one; I had, during the previous week, received confirmation of a successful bid on a contract that promised to be most lucrative for my business - so I was in a mood to reward myself in some way.

For another; I had for some time thought there was a large area of one wall in my apartment that was loudly crying out for some sort of decoration or adornment.

And finally; I noticed that the gallery was one that I had passed many times - but never actually gone in to - on my way to and from a local pasta bistro that had long been a favourite, if only occasional, dining place.

So, I thought to myself - by the time I had showered and shaved, then stripped and re-made the bed in preparation for the satisfying activities I expected my friend and I to be enjoying after the concert, then done the necessary cleaning and tidying - I would probably be quite ready for a light pasta lunch. A visit to the gallery would be on my way there, and, one never knew, but a few minutes look around might possibly lead me to find something that would both fill that empty space and also complement the few other paintings I already owned.

And that was how I found myself, a few hours later, pushing open the door of what proved to be a rather larger gallery than one would have thought possible from merely viewing its exterior. What was also immediately apparent, even to a purely self-trained eye such as mine, was that the collection being shown was - to say the very least - an eclectic one. Not only was there a seemingly random mix of sculptures, figurines and other objects, but even the variety of styles of the paintings themselves, were all mixed together to produce what was a sometimes positively clashing assortment of items to choose from.

However, unlike so many such places, the assistant - having greeted me warmly - left me to browse around at my leisure, and as I was still feeling replete from my overly large breakfast, I was in no rush to move on to the pasta place, so took my time, wandering here and there as my eye or mood took me.

So it was perhaps half an hour or so before I saw a painting that immediately stopped me - a large oil; done in essentially indigo and crimson, with a seemingly random scattering of highlights picked out in either grey or white.

Whilst it was an abstract; the longer I stood there, looking into it, the more clearly I thought I saw - or maybe it was merely sensed - an underlying theme, or at least a vague representation of one. Nothing about the painting was at all clear, but somehow the shapes and colours - at least in my own mind - seemed to be performing some sensuously erotic dance around each other. And in that case those scattered highlights might well be their perspiration - or if one applied an even more salacious interpretation, their resulting secretions or discharges.

It was in short, a very powerful painting - and as I knew it was also the right colour combination for the space I had in mind for it - it was exactly the kind of image I would enjoy looking into for a very long to time to come.

I headed back to the front of the gallery and told the assistant I would like to purchase the painting, but as I hadn't finished my tour of the gallery she should wait to see if I found anything else that also took my fancy. I had of course made a mental note of the artist's name - she had signed it with just the single one, '

Annabel'

- and having been alerted to that I found several other paintings also by her, but none that caught my eye the way the one I had bought had.

Until then I had been concentrating on the paintings in the gallery, but having exhausted that section I wandered around to an area that, whilst still containing a few more, was more predominantly used to display various styles of ceramics. Now I know even less about such things than I do about the other Arts - so that means I know virtually nothing at all - but as I imagine we all do, some things appeal and others are not much more than some sort of seemingly strangely coloured shape.

So I surprised myself when, not too long after starting to work my way through that area, I saw a piece that appealed to me in much the same way that '

Annabel's'

painting had. At first glance it looked like no more than a representation of a rather large, undoubtedly tropical, flower - its petals still in the act of opening, but already displaying the lighter coloured space deep down within them. Perhaps it was the primary colour that first caught my eye - a crimson that was in many ways a version of the colour in the painting I had bought.

But although I was tempted to carry it back to where the painting still hung - just to see if my impression was right or not - I resisted, and continued on my way through the rest of the ceramics.

So it was in one sense, no great surprise, when a few minutes later I spotted another piece - this one in primarily the indigo that was the other predominant colour in the painting - but it was the shape of the object that finally gave the artist's game away. Although not specifically, and certainly not graphically, a phallus, it was most definitely 'phallus-like' - and I did what I perhaps should have done when looking at the first piece, I picked it up and turned it over to examine the underside of its base. And yes, sure enough, there was her signature again - '

Annabel'

, this time with the addition of '

His - 7'

.

Still holding it, I moved back to the first piece, picked it up and examined it, sure enough - '

Annabel'

and '

Hers 7'

. The two pieces were a matching pair, so why the gallery hadn't displayed them in that way confounded me. But that wasn't my business, I simply carried the two objects back to the assistant, told her I had spent all I could afford for that day, and asked her to take my credit card information.

As she did so, she asked when and where she should arrange delivery - and I told her that if she had some way of water-proofing the painting, and if the gallery would still be open for another hour or so, I would save them the cost by later carrying the three items home with me.

That done, I headed off for my by then much looked forward to lunch, and after that, returned to the gallery to collect my newly acquired acquisitions. As the girl handed them over to me she said that she had taken the liberty of adding my name to their mailing list; adding that in addition to various showings during the year, some of their artists - including Annabel - occasionally opened their studios to previous clients, and I was now of course one of those.

I said that was perfectly all right by me, collected my very well wrapped parcels and headed back home again.

*

Chapter 2

Now whilst it was the similarity of colouring between the painting and the two ceramic objects, that had caught my eye, it was only when I unwrapped them and held them that I fully appreciated exactly what the artist, what Annabel, had achieved. The crimson object was not of course, some tropical flower, but a vulva! A vulva opening in preparation for it to receive the second object, the phallus.

And not only was it a representation of that, when I actually - very gingerly - slid the phallus into the vulva's opening, it not only fitted, it fitted absolutely smoothly and perfectly!

Clearly I had absolutely no idea as to how an artist might be able to create such a fine degree of tolerance between two, presumably hand-moulded and then glazed objects, but Annabel had obviously done so. And not only that; but I realised that the base on which each was supported, was multi-faceted, and when one piece was inserted into the other, they could, if the owner wished to, actually be displayed in that way.

Even though I had already been very pleased with my spontaneously made purchases, finding such eroticism in the ceramics made me look at the painting again. And, with the benefit of that additional insight, I saw that what might have been merely swirlingly abstract forms and indefinable shapes, did have - hidden both beneath and within them - the same undoubted sexual driving force.

To say I was delighted, would have been to say but half of it - I was thrilled to the core, not only had I acquired pieces that pleased my eye, but ones that could, when I was in the mood for them to do so, stir something very, very much deeper within me.

I guess most men enjoy the occasional exposure to erotica - whether in film, TV or print - some to much more extreme and overtly blatant pornography - and whilst that type of material did not do anything for me, something more subtly restrained could certainly do so. And whilst the ceramic phallus and vulva could, if displayed when united, not really be deemed 'subtle', if at least a little separated, they could be viewed quite differently.

So I had been given a choice; when I wished to be mildly stimulated I could move them into their passionate position, and at others they would each be no more than something that was rather pleasing to the eye.

And that was exactly how I used and viewed them over the next few weeks. However, the painting - and the images I thought I saw embedded within it - grew progressively clearer, and, as they did so, became even more disturbingly arousing.

It seemed that at times the swirl of colours actually took on the form of a couple; sometimes lovingly embracing one another, at others, performing far, far more vigorously. Sometimes the indigo phallus was clearly the dominant force - thrusting powerfully into the wetly open pussy - and at others it was the crimson vulva that was actively forcing itself down on to the stiffly and eagerly throbbing cock.

Just as with any optical illusion - once we have spotted, or had the alternate image pointed out to us - having seen the full depth of the eroticism within the painting, I couldn't imagine how I had ever viewed it as nothing much more than an abstractly pleasing swirl of colour. But, having done so I found it had a far more profound effect on me than any other piece of artwork - each time I viewed it that new way it seemed to leave me with a heightened sense of my own still fully vibrant sexuality. So much so that the woman I was occasionally sharing my bed with was caused to remark on my noticeably increasing potency.

But even so, when some weeks later my post included an invitation to an artist's private showing, I was at first confused as to why I - a very modest buyer of such items - should have been included. It was only when I read through the detail a second time that I actually realised who the artist was - 'Annabel'.

And as by then wild horses couldn't have kept me away, a couple of weeks after that I was standing amidst a crowd of people on the upper level of a warehouse - the lower floors of which had been converted to apartments - but this entire one, to just Annabel's studio. I was later to discover that the discreetly curtained section I saw actually led to an area where she sometimes lived - but the rest of the space, which contained and were lit by the remaining skylights, was devoted to being her work area.

The throng included all the types of people one would have expected to see at such a gathering; many suddenly far too wealthy people needing something to spend their probably ill-gotten gains on - desperately posing as long-time Art lovers. Others - far less expensively, but more creatively dressed - expressing long-winded and usually volubly abstruse opinions about each piece they found themselves standing in front of. And just a handful of people more like myself - moving much more thoughtfully quietly amongst the images and objects Annabel had left on display for our viewing.

And moving skilfully amongst the entire assembly was a woman who I took to be the artist herself.

In just about every way she was the absolute antithesis of what I thought of as being femininely 'attractive'. For one thing, at just a little over five feet, she was very much shorter than any woman I had ever been out with, and for another, although the long, flowing dress did its best to disguise her body shape, it ended up making it appear even more rectangular. In fact on a scale that had the overly voluptuous Venus of Willendorf at the upper end, and any of the current crop of rake-thin super-models at the bottom, I would have to say that Annabel's body would be in the higher ten to twenty percent.

And by comparison, the women I was always initially attracted to - who were tall and long-legged, and usually had bodies that were more of the 'trim, taut and terrific' variety - if she hadn't been the artist, she would not have attracted even a second glance from me

In time she came close to where I was standing, looking at a rather less confronting painting than the one I had bought for myself, so I was of course then able to get a closer and much better look at her.

Her hair was what one would have to call a mousy mid-brown, and exemplified the general image of the artist; being almost wildly unkempt, with bits of it flying out in several quite opposing directions. But her face - as is often the case with women who are on the large side - was an extraordinarily sweet one. The combination of her fresh, unmade-up complexion and her brightly twinkling blue-green eyes and cupid's-bow mouth gave it an almost youthfully girlish appearance.

Yet, in spite of the various and sometimes conflicting aspects of her appearance Annabel certainly had an aura about her - and to me it was one that meshed with the feelings I had felt when I had been staring at my painting for far too long. Even to someone like me, who might not normally even notice her, she literally exuded sexuality - of the very rawest kind.

In fact the sense of it was - at least to me it was - almost overwhelming, and I found I had to mentally shake myself and allow the unappetising size of her to remind me that she was not a woman I would want to feel that way about.

A few minutes later she drifted away from the group she had been talking to and came to stand alongside me. 'So, what do you think of this one?' she asked in a surprisingly low, well modulated voice.

'To be frank, nowhere near as much as another one of yours that I bought a couple of months ago. But then perhaps it's just that green is not a colour that has ever done very much for me.' I added with what I hoped was a placatorily friendly grin.

'Oh you're already a client of mine - how nice!' she replied. 'So, which one was that?'

'I don't think it had a title. I bought it at 'Zachary's', along with a couple of your ceramic pieces, and those did have a sort of title on their bases - '

His-

7'

and '

Hers-7'

- which seemed to me to go precisely with the painting I had already taken a liking to.' I explained.

'Ah yes, that little set - I think that if you look very carefully down at the bottom right-hand corner of your painting you should find a number seven scratched into the paint surface. And so you were absolutely correct, those three pieces were made to go together - and I'm delighted that this is at least one set that has found itself being housed in the one home.'

'Well the gallery didn't help them; if they were meant to be a set then surely they should have displayed them together? In many ways it was purely good fortune that I spotted their apparent relationship, even the two ceramics were being displayed separately.'

'Oh I had quite a fight with them over that.' Annabel retorted hotly. 'All they ended up saying was that they thought the combination of the three pieces would be far too overtly sexual for their usual type of customers - can you imagine that?'

'Not really, no - especially since it took me a while to see the full strength of the underlying sexuality, especially in the painting. I did find it much more quickly in the ceramics of course - and I'm absolutely fascinated to know how you were able to get two pieces of that type of material to fit together quite so snugly.' I added.

She grinned broadly, winked, and replied. 'Come, come, you can't expect an artist to hand over all her trade secrets after such a brief meeting. I mean at this stage I don't even know your name.'

'Phillip - Phillip Lawson.' I replied.

'Thank you, and I truly am Annabel, it's not just a '

nom de plume'

- or, as an artist I suppose I should say '

nom de pinceau'.

She answered with a mocking, almost self-deprecatory smile. 'But to return to this picture again.' she continued, drawing my attention back to the painting in front of us. 'You say your opinion is influenced by my use of the colour green?'

'Yes - well I suspect so. As I said, green - at least as a primarily decorative colour - has never really appealed to me. And a painting has to in some ways blend with the interior décor of where it's to be hung - well at least in my case I think it needs to.' I added, again somewhat appeasingly.

'Well of course I'm sure you don't expect me to agree with that - I believe a painting should broadcast its message - even if that is usually done with rather more subtlety than many of mine do. And if the colour helps it to do that, then to hell with its surrounding décor.'