Two Americans in Paris (7 page)

She is filling herself with the stars in your eyes

For our midterm I have studied with the intent of getting an A. I know you and I will share our grades and I want mine to be admirable.

In our classroom at AUP, I sit in a chair in front of you and wait to see if you will say hi. In order to appear occupied I arrange my pen and paper on my desk. Finally, because you have not said anything to me, I decide it would be impolite to say nothing to you. I turn around to face you.

“Hey, how was Vienna?” I ask.

“It was fun,” you say, but your voice droops with fatigue and is scratchy. Your skin is drained of its warmth, the whites of your eyes stained with pink.

“Are you okay?” I ask.

“Uh, I barely made it here. My Navigo pass ran out and I thought it would still be okay, but it wasn’t, and I had no change and they wouldn’t take my credit card and I was having trouble communicating. I almost cried.” Your voice catches as you recall the distress you felt.

“Aw. At least you got here okay in the end!”

“Yeah.”

The thought of your distress causes me distress and I wish I could comfort you or that I could have helped you this morning. I imagine you at the ticket booth, your back slouched over in frustration, and I am there to aid you, swooping in with my French and some spare change.

Professor passes out the questions. The three essay questions each span enormous lengths of time, demanding the full force of our mental abilities. We set to work, formulating our mini-theses of art history. Although the questions are challenging I feel confident in my responses.

When I’m done with the exam, I hand in my papers to Professor, gather my things, and leave you writing away at your desk: a far more dedicated student than me.

She is living in a season of unnourished heat

After our midterm, I decide to again invite you to spend time with me outside of class. This time, though, I decide not to ask you in person, but through Facebook. I request your friendship and once you confirm, I first check your relationship status. Previous to this point, I had hoped your relationship may not have been serious enough to warrant being Facebook-official. Alas, my denial was destroyed in the space of a digital moment: you are “In a Relationship,” your profile says. But this is no matter. It is clear to me that your relationship is not a happy one—the sole time you mentioned your girlfriend, you did not light up with joy but acted melancholy. Your attentions are not focused on her, but on everywhere and everyone else.

I send you a friendly message inviting you to see
Transformers
with me later this week. You haven’t yet expressed as much interest in me as I would like, so in my message I add that “I get that you have a girlfriend. I’m not going to try to get into your pants (not that I wouldn’t . . .)”. I hope to simultaneously plant the idea in your head that sleeping with me is an option, so you might see me as someone who might be more than your friend, and also to deflect any concern you might have about my intentions. Of course, the assertion that I won’t try to get into your pants is a lie. If you let me, I have every intention of clasping my fingers on the pull of your jean’s zipper and stirring the sex that lies beneath.

You promptly respond, “Transformers would be great . . . I’m honored that you’d get in my pants ;-)”

I am overjoyed that at last we have plans to hang out, just the two of us. However, that you would be “honored” I would sleep with you concerns me. In my experience, sex has little to do with honor. Regardless of any amorous connection, it is a pure, basic expression of carnal attraction. However, the flirtatiousness of the wink emoticon at the end of your message reassures me that you are more than just honored by my attraction to you. There is only one day to wait—one art history class between now and our evening outing.

The following day at the Musée d’Orsay, where we are having class, I find our classmates gathered among the animal statues I adore seeing when I come to the museum. They’re like giant, grown-up toys you admire instead of playing with. The wild-eyed horse extends his hunter-green foreleg against the azure sky, the elephant raises his trunk above his head, and the stout rhinoceros stands with his head held proudly. Upon seeing me you grin. Your eyes, lightened to the color of dark, golden honey in the sunlight, are affixed on me, gleaming with what I assume are lustful thoughts. The strength of your gaze fills me with a powerful sense that our relations have taken on a distinct and irrevocable sexual charge. I say, “Hey” and smile back. The message I sent to you has had the effect I desired. In your eyes, I am no longer only a friend with whom you may discuss intellectual topics, but also someone with whom you may enjoy more sensuous activities.

One student asks, to no one in particular, “Does Professor have his Ph.D. yet?” As a class, we don’t actually call Professor a professor. We call him by his first name since he’s hip and young like us—I just think of him as Professor because he’s a brilliant teacher.

“Almost. He defends sometime next spring, I think,” I say. As soon as I’ve responded the other students are curious and continue to ask questions.

“Where does he go?” another student asks.

“CUNY. The City University of New York,” I say.

“How old is he?” another student asks.

“Thirty-three,” I say.

Amazed looks appear on my classmates’ faces. “Really? No, he can’t be more than in his twenties! I thought he was barely older than us,” they say.

I grin, pleased to have the inside scoop on our teacher. “Nope, he’s thirty-three.”

Professor arrives and we follow him into the interior of the museum. The ceiling is coffered with beautifully carved white stone and the gilded late nineteenth-century clock preserved from the Gare d’Orsay serves as the main hall’s centerpiece. Along the center aisle runs a winding path of statues: some white, others bronze, each pensive on a bench, gracefully arched, or supine and nude.

Professor stops in a room displaying Courbet’s work and establishes him as the first avant-garde artist—a revolutionary painter who jumped out of the classical codes by painting
Burial at Ornans
. “It’s a giant painting about nothing,” Professor says. “It’s too big for its subject. It’s as big as a history painting but doesn’t portray a historical story. There’s no moral—it’s just stuff happening. People are gathered for a funeral. The priests are drunk.” Professor points out their red cheeks. “Everyone is disconnected.” At hearing the word “disconnected,” I look over at you. We live in a world where it is increasingly difficult to form meaningful bonds with other people, but already I feel intrinsically linked to you, despite having known you only a few weeks.

Professor finishes his lecture about Courbet with
The Artist’s Studio (A Real Allegory)
and then takes us past the Manet paintings without saying a word, even though I know Manet is one of his favorite artists. He stops in front of Cabanel’s
Naissance de Vénus
. Venus’ sinuous body is splayed across a smooth rock, her long torso thrust forward, her thighs rubbing together lustfdully. She appears perfectly relaxed, on view for our pleasure. Her porcelain skin glows softly and her eyes are only half-open as if she is in a sensuous daze. The tips of her long red curls are dipped into the ocean whose tiny waves lap around her. Putti arranged like a line of musical notes flutter above her, creating a pleasing Baroque rhythm.

Cabanel’s
Vénus
is the sort of artwork I aspire to create someday—unabashedly beautiful, naughty, and clearly inspired by a muse. As though my subconscious is already attuned to your fate of becoming my muse, my gaze flits to you. You ignite my emotions just by your sheer presence and I am overwhelmed with the beauty I find in your every aspect. I could write endlessly about my fantasy of you that permeates every corner of my mind. Even in front of such a gorgeous artwork, the pale, golden freckles across your nose and cheeks appear to shimmer and your pale skin, subtly burnished by the sun, glows radiantly.

As Professor begins to speak, I refocus most of my attention on the painting.

“Even though the avant-garde was going on at the same time, there were still artists sticking to Baroque aesthetics,” Professor says. “Venus is a classical goddess. This style derives from David and Ingres. Its emphasis is on line. Color is just filled in. Is she confrontational?” he asks, drawing our attention to her passive body language and soft facial expression. He answers his own question: “No. She lies down and takes it. Her eyes are half-glazed. We can look at her but she doesn’t look back. You don’t hide her sex because she’s the goddess of love. It’s a PG-13 movie, officially coded. The putti’s placement is all highly planned to evoke formal rhythms,” Professor says, moving his hand along the bobbing, winged infants. “This would be displayed at the salon and men could bring their wives and look at this. The women would say ‘Oh, woman is such a beautiful thing” and their husbands would say ‘Yes,’ and everyone is happy. Like all classical works, she is painted without pubic hair. Cabanel, having only ever seen classical representations of nude women, experienced quite a fright on his wedding night. But that’s an aside, a filthy art historical aside.”

We giggle and Professor leads us away, striding toward Manet. On our way, we pass a white marble statue of a woman lying with her hips contorted toward us, her head thrown so far backwards it is not visible from our vantage point. I imagine myself in the same position, my body on display for your pleasure.

Professor stops at Manet’s
Olympia
and looks at the painting with keen appreciation before speaking about it. Professor’s admiration of this painting makes me wonder how your opinion of it compares to his. I look over at you and your eyes are fastened on Olympia’s stark, snowy breasts and modeled abdomen, her fingernail-less hands, your attention fully absorbed. To see how focused you are when appreciating art fills me with an uplifting warmth. I imagine that everything you learn from Professor becomes a mark on the diverse, multidimensional map of your mind and that with time you might become more like him.

“This is the most important painting of the nineteenth century, probably the most important painting you’ll see in this class,” Professor says. “There is more meaning in every drop of paint in this painting than any of the other paintings in this museum.” He pauses to think over this statement. “Yes,” he nods. “Tons of scholarly writing has been done just on the placement of her hand. She’s staring at us—she has a poker face. Adultery is a major issue in polite society at the time this was painted. Courtesans had various high bourgeois patrons who would come visit them in their little love palaces. She has her hand over her sex. Is this about shame? No. She’s very direct, looks right at you.” He draws a line between her gaze and us—we are both his attentive students and Olympia’s attentive audience. “The painting is titled
Olympia
, who is a classical Greek goddess. How does this change our understanding of the painting?”

“Manet is playing with labels and representation,” Mermaid offers.

Professor nods. “Yes. Manet is a DJ—remixing things we already know. It’s based on a Venetian nude painting,
Venus of Urbino
by Titian. In Titian’s there’s a sleeping dog at the woman’s feet. Dogs represented fealty and marital bliss. In
Olympia
there’s a startled black cat at her feet.” He rounds his hand over the cat’s arched back. “Baudelaire called cats ‘sugary vampires,’ hah. She has many men. You’re always the stranger, always alienated. It’s harshly illuminated. Manet suppresses his middle tones. He’s outlined her. There is very little rounding of form or modeling. Sometimes the line is very clear, sometimes it’s much softer with color. He makes different adjustments with the paint. She doesn’t have any fingernails.” He points to the blank tips of Olympia’s fingers. “No one has ever answered the question of why Manet often did not paint fingernails; it’s not as if he couldn’t. Sometimes they’re there, sometimes they’re not. It’s one of those art historical anomalies.”

Olympia’s fingers are so carefully modeled by Manet’s masterful hand that her lack of fingernails is hardly noticeable, but the puzzle of why Manet would not paint them nags at the back of my mind.

On our way to the escalators to look at the Impressionist art upstairs, Professor stops us by William Bouguereau’s
Naissance de Vénus
, an unabashedly sensuous expression of Baroque aesthetics. Of all the paintings in the d’Orsay, it
is the one I find the most enthrallingly beautiful. The painting is mounted high on the wall so you must gaze up at Venus. She stands atop her pearl-white seashell, one hip torqued upward to emphasize her waist, and gently threads her fingers through the thick golden-red curls that drape down her back. She has a touch of the soft fleshiness Rubens is known for as well as a trace of the fine musculature of
Venus de Milo
. Venus is entrancing. She stands naked before her admirers at her most beautiful and pretends to be ignorant of and indifferent to the eager gazes affixed to her body. I imagine this method of seduction might be effective on you—I want so much to bring you closer to me.

It occurs to me that if I am willing to employ any variety of techniques to seduce you, I probably want more from you than just a summer fling. I spent the entire métro ride here listening to “Meaningless” by The Magnetic Fields, attempting to persuade myself that my infatuation is without meaning, but my obsessive method itself proves that my desire for you is far more than physical. I am attracted to the girth of your lithe thighs, the build of your shapely calves, the strength of your flat abdomen, and the round of your shoulders as well as the handsome coils of your brain coursing with enlightened thoughts. Most of all, I believe we could grow together and learn from each other. Although I see Professor as my ideal in most ways, his intelligence and experiences are far more developed than my own. Intellectual exchange is nearly always unbalanced, with him as the teacher and I the student, which makes him an excellent mentor, but would not make him a good romantic partner. And he is already married, of course.

Professor begins to speak about the painting. “This is another example of the kind of Baroque painting contemporary with the avant-garde movement. It’s another version of the birth of Venus, like Cabanel’s—”

A museum guard with bushy hair pokes her head into our group, interrupting Professor. The guard insists that Professor needs an official reservation to continue lecturing, even though Professor assures her he made a reservation. Rather than waste thirty minutes of class time acquiring the proper permissions to have class here, we move away from the rude guard. When Professor thinks he is out of her earshot he continues to talk. But she has followed and barks furiously at us, calling us a “savage group.” Professor, extremely offended by her intrusion, makes indignant exclamations under his breath as he leads us away. We regroup outside and prepare to receive our midterms.

A male guard yells at our classmate sitting on a seat of concrete, telling him he can’t sit there and has to move.

“Right, because concrete is so unstable,” the student mutters under his breath as he slides off.