Daniel James
If the world were clear, art would not exist453
I rested my head against the glass as the train to Newcastle rocked back and forth gently. The mist that rolled across the fields, past isolated farmhouses and under a baking sun, blurred the horizon, making the world soft and smudged around the edges. Waves of light and particles of dust came into being and fell out of existence, coalescing into a landscape as the train sped north. Sunlight danced on the surface of the Tyne as we crossed one of its famous bridges and entered the city, as I came home at last.
Once I was back, I didn’t speak the name Ezra Maas for two days. I was a father again. I held my children in my arms, carried them on my shoulders, threw them in the air, and let them climb all over me. Days of laughter and tickles, cuddles and kisses. I was a husband again. Life returned to how it might have been if different choices had been made. My other life, London, the book, Ezra Maas, was all just a bad dream, but I should have known that you can’t run from your own shadow, you can’t escape from one dream into another. I said my goodbyes and returned to real life. When the train pulled to a stop, the sunlight on the surface of the Tyne had disappeared. My other life was just an illusion, a trick of the light. I walked out of the station, into the cold air, reality hitting home like an icy wave.
I was here to see an artist whose exhibition454 had been the victim of guerrilla artwork by Maas, or one of his followers. The Guardian had covered the incident, comparing it to when Banksy infiltrated the Museum of Modern Art and covertly installed his own artworks on display in the gallery.455 Joanna hadn’t seen the intruder herself, but several witnesses had noticed a strange man at her exhibition, and someone had apparently signed one of her programmes with the name ‘Ezra Maas’. It wasn’t the first time this had happened. Since taking this job, my publisher had been inundated with calls from people who claimed to have information about Maas, including a number of similar guerrilla stunts. Everyone wanted to be a part of the story, but most of the reports filtered through to me led nowhere. People saw Maas here, there, and everywhere, but I was intrigued by the newspaper story about Joanna Hutton’s exhibition. It was just crazy enough to be true, and the Newcastle connection seemed like too much of a coincidence to ignore. I was being called back home by a fresh lead just as I needed to escape London.
The streets were full of ghosts. Medieval castle walls intersected with classical architecture, early 20th century engineering merged with brutal angular monoliths, and restored shipping warehouses stood side by side with contemporary glass and steel constructions; the past and present coexisted, layer upon layer of time, occupying the same space, filled with the spectres of potential futures and half-realised visions that could never fully disappear. A city that haunted itself.
A few ugly, concrete scars remained, but Newcastle had survived the T Dan Smith456 era, and his faux Utopian plans for ‘Brasilia of the North’, the city and its people enduring long enough to see its most beautiful buildings restored to their former grandeur by legitimate cultural regeneration, with new and iconic landmarks rising up along the Quayside and throughout the City Centre, in place of what was lost.
Today, like most cities, Newcastle faced a different kind of battle – to retain any kind of identity in the face of super-modernity, where difference was eroded and washed away in place of homogenous, global brands. Where you no longer lived in a city, you lived in Terminal 5. It was the kind of bleak, late capitalist, future predicted by the anthropologist Marc Augé, who first coined the term ‘non-places’.457
Everywhere was becoming nowhere.
I didn’t want that to happen to a city as special as Newcastle. For better or worse, it was, and would always be, my home.
I walked up Grainger Street towards Grey’s Monument and the city centre. The buildings in Grainger Town were among the finest examples of classical architecture in the country, rivalling Bath and Edinburgh, and the jewels in the crown of historic Newcastle. Grey Street, whose gentle downward curve towards the river had captivated the poet John Betjeman, was arguably the best of the lot. Joanna Hutton’s gallery was nearby on High Bridge Street, a fashionable cobbled lane filled with cafes, bars, restaurants, and shops.
I wished I had time for more old haunts; the vaulted ceilings of the library at the Lit & Phil, the Art Deco glamour of the Tyneside Cinema, the food stalls and traders in the Grainger Market, the pubs and live music in the Ouseburn, but I had to be all business.
Joanna’s gallery was closed until 5pm, so I messaged Vicky and decided to kill time in a basement bar I knew well. It was hidden away beneath a smoke and tap house. There were no signs, no windows, just a heavy wooden door with a grate that slid across to let you glimpse inside. It was small, dark, and heavy on atmosphere, with flickering candles in red glass table lamps, leather seats, low wooden ceilings, murals of skeletons, and faded film noir icons on the walls, and quotes from the likes of Tom Waits, Charles Bukowski, and William Burroughs.
The bartender 458 wore rolled up shirt sleeves, with a waistcoat and a pocket watch. He was tall and broad-shouldered, with a thick woodsman beard. I took a seat on one of the bar stools and scanned the red, leather-bound, cocktail menu, its skulls and chemical symbols straight out of an apothecary, while I waited for him to turn around . Art Garfunkel’s version of I Only Have Eyes For You was playing in the background.459
‘Hey Joe.’
‘Dan,’ he replied. ‘It’s been awhile.’
‘I’ve been out of town.’
‘What can I get you?’
‘The usual.’
I watched as Joe worked his magic, skilfully mixing together Rittenhouse 100 Proof Rye whiskey with house-made coffee stout liqueur, Campari, Byrrh, Mellow Corn whiskey, and Fernet-Branca, before adding a pinch of sea salt and finally stirring it with a cinnamon quill. Joe placed a black napkin down on the counter and slid the heavy glass tumbler across to me. One drink quickly turned into three. I was just about to order a fourth when the door opened to my right, and I watched a woman enter on my periphery. She walked up to the bar and slid an envelope along to me. I reached out and caught it.
‘You were right about that theatrical agency,’ Vicky smiled. ‘I said the name ‘Ezra Maas’ and they practically told me their life story.’
I stood up and gave her a hug.
‘What’s in the envelope?’
‘It turns out Warren Wagner Associates has been forwarding royalty payments to a farm in Northumberland for the last fifteen years.’
‘And you got the address?’ I smiled. ‘I think maybe you should be the detective.’
‘Beginner’s luck.’
‘I don’t know about that. You’ve always been full of surprises.’
I ordered the same again and a Lynn Collins460 for Vicky. As I looked through the contents of the envelope, we reminisced about the good old days when we used to sit across from each other at the magazine; I would come in late and hung-over, and she’d help wake me up with strong coffee, water, and painkillers, then we’d get to work. When we were done reminiscing, I put the envelope safely into my bag and settled the bill.
‘It’s been good seeing you, Dan.’
‘And you,’ I replied, as we clinked glasses and finished the last of our drinks.
‘I like the beard,’ she said. ‘It suits you.’
‘It was the best disguise I could come up with,’ I replied.
She laughed, but I could tell there was something on her mind.
‘Look, I know you’ve got to go, so I’ll cut straight to the chase. Sam has been worried about you…I have too.’
‘You don’t need to worry. I can take care of myself.’
‘I know that, but you shouldn’t have to. Not when you have people here who care about you…It must be lonely, the way you live.’
‘I’m not lonely,’ I replied, unconvincingly. My voice was distant and empty, a recording of a recording.
‘You can’t fool me,’ she said.
‘It’s too late,’ I said quietly, and stood up to leave.
‘You know, it’s not the Maas Foundation that scares me. I’m more worried about you.’
I kissed her on the cheek and headed for the door.
‘Goodbye, Vicky.’
‘Dan?’ Her voice faltered for a second.
I wanted to turn around and smile my usual smile. I wanted to reassure her like the old days, but I couldn’t.
‘You’re not coming back, are you?’ she said, behind me. ‘Even if you find out the truth…you’re not coming back.’
* * *
As I expected, the artist Joanna Hutton was happy to be interviewed. She was a conceptual artist who had begun to incorporate preserved birds into her work, after a chance visit to a taxidermist inspired her to become a member of the Guild of Taxidermists. Her disconcertingly beautiful installations often featured avian elements, reflecting her fascination with the symbolism, superstitions, and folklore, surrounding birds. If someone from the Maas Foundation really had attended her exhibition, they clearly shared a similar preoccupation to Joanna’s, for on the signed programme to her show, they had also written: ‘Do birds carry the souls of the dead?’
Joanna’s installations incorporated natural materials and found objects, like fishing wire and a wasp nest, as well as the preserved bodies of blackbirds and robins. Her latest piece continued in this tradition and was called Gravity. She couldn’t explain why the Maas Foundation would be interested in her show. She had no connection to Maas other than the indirect influence his work had on most contemporary artists. I couldn’t help but feel there was something I was missing.
The programme Maas had supposedly signed had been folded up and placed in a box set aside for gathering feedback on the exhibition. Several students who were helping with hospitality had described a strange man hanging around during the show, and when the note was found they naturally concluded this must have been Maas. The signature looked near identical to the handwriting on the property deed I had discovered at the apartment in Soho, but that didn’t necessarily prove anything. Signatures could be faked, and I had no reason to believe Maas wasn’t dead. If he was alive, why would he show up here? And what was his interest in Joanna’s work? It was more likely that someone was trying to keep his presence alive in the world and that this was a message for me, rather than Joanna. I looked again at her latest piece, entitled Gravity; the corpse of a bird preserved within a mirrored box, and for a moment I saw myself as the bird, trapped by endless reflections.
‘Are you okay?’ Joanna asked.
‘Yes…sorry,’ I smiled, and gestured at the bird. ‘I was just imagining myself in his place.’
We talked for a while longer, but it was getting late and Joanna needed to lock up. I thanked her for her time and told her to call me if she thought of anything else. As I went to leave, I walked past the box where the note had been found. I stopped.
‘This is probably a long shot, but did anyone else leave any unusual comments in the box?’ I asked.
‘That’s a good question. I don’t know, to be honest. Everybody was so excited to find the autograph that I don’t think we examined the others very closely. You’re welcome to take a look through them if you like?’
I didn’t spot anything unusual until I got to the last one. Most people wouldn’t have noticed it, but I had become used to codes, conditioned to secret messages whether they were from Maas or someone else. Someone had used a pencil to strike through certain letters on the printed text of Joanna’s programme notes. I took out a pen and began to copy them down. One by one, they began to form familiar words. The first three spelled out ‘D-A-N’. It couldn’t be…I wrote down the next three. ‘R-U-N’. My heart began to pound inside my chest. It was too explicit a message to be a coincidence. I looked around quickly and began to walk out of the building as fast as I could.
My mind raced. The note had been left weeks ago when the exhibition first opened. Was I finally going mad, finding meaning where there was none? Or had this really been left for me? There was no way anyone could have known that I would be here today.
As I walked out of the gallery and turned onto Grey Street, a black Land Rover slowed to a stop. Three men in suits got out and began to walk behind me. When I crossed the road and cut down Shakespeare Street, they followed. I broke into a run in the direction of the Metro station, hoping to lose them in the crowds. The station was a maze of yellowed enamel panels and angular strips of lighting, scratched steel and scuffed rubber, alive with the rumble of trains, and the purr of machinery. The underground map looked like a circulatory system ripped out of someone’s body. I glanced over my shoulder as I weaved through the crowds. They were right behind me now, and one of them was holding a knife in his gloved hand. I began to sprint as fast as I could, heart racing, chest pounding, screaming for people to get out of the way. Move! Move! I saw myself being stabbed to death there in the station, unable to run for all those dumb bodies, surrounded by confused faces struggling to understand what was happening, while I collapsed to my knees, blood pumping out from my chest and seeping through my fingers, my killers disappearing before anyone realises they’re looking at a dead man.
I wasn’t going to make it. There were too many people blocking the way, and they were right behind. Almost without thinking, I turned around and punched the nearest of the men as hard as I could. He fell backwards into the others, and all of a sudden I was running again, fighting my way to the escalator, my head pounding as I pushed people out of the way and threw myself down the stairs, past startled faces woken from their daydreaming by my flight. Behind me, people were shouting abuse, but I didn’t look back. A couple standing side by side on the escalator were slowing me down, so I leapt over the rail and onto the plastic panels running in between, sliding the rest of the way down to the tiled-floor. I hit the ground running, my shoes slipping and sliding as I tried, and failed, to keep my balance. A large man cursed at me after I slammed into him, but I was moving so fast I was around the corner before I even registered his words. I tried to remember the layout of the station, but the corridors all looked identical.
Air rushed through the tunnels, followed by the distant purr of trains coming and going beneath the city. I ran out onto the busy platform. The orange lights on the electronic timetable danced, as words and numbers dissolved and reformed. My train would be here any minute, but I was running out of time. One of the black figures on my periphery was getting closer. I moved down the platform, working my way between the bodies, but I was heading for a dead end.
The train arrived, full of light and noise, just as a gloved hand reached for my jacket. Instead of pulling away, I grabbed hold of the man’s arm, spinning us both towards the edge of the platform as the train rushed toward us. I pushed him back and into its path. The screaming and sirens were indistinguishable as I ran up the escalator and back out into the city.
END
Notes
453. French philosopher, author and journalist Albert Camus (1913 – 1960), The Myth of Sisyphus.
454. Aporias, 2011 – ’12.
455. These incidents are alleged to have taken place in March 2005 and saw Banksy allegedly subvert artworks in the Museum of Modern Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, and American Museum of Natural History in Manhattan, as well as the Brooklyn Museum in Brooklyn – Anonymous.
456. T. Dan Smith (1915 – 1993) was a British politician and leader of Newcastle City Council from 1960 – 1965. An innovative documentary film about his life and career, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Utopia, was released in 1988, produced by Newcastle’s Amber Films. Although his impact of Newcastle’s historic architecture is referenced negatively, the demolition of buildings such as old Eldon Square and Dobson’s Royal Arcade took place after he left office.
457. For more on Marc Auge and non-places see my footnotes on Pg. xx – Anonymous.
458. Believed to be Newcastle-based mixologist Joe Summerfield – Anonymous.
459. A No.1 hit from his 1975 album, Breakaway, the song is a jazz standard and was originally written in 1934 for the film Dames.
460. Lychee-infused gin, lemongrass-infused St Germain, lemon juice and Ginger Beer.