{ASSD} This Week's Quiz: the Hopper Collection
Mmtwassel
the Hopper Collection." I don't see any reason not to let
it go another week. For anyone who's missed the links,
they're repeated below. If you don't find Hopper or Thomas
Hart Benton to your taste, feel free to try Matisse, Monet,
or even Klee! There's inspiration everywhere, I'm
convinced, but if you're ever stuck, art is a good place to
go for unsticking.
Incidentally, it's a conceit of mine that I was conceived
under a large print of some Matisse painting.. Actually my
mom preferred Van Gogh, but I already had a second cousin
Vince. It must have been some time in September, early in
the semester, that my mom and dad hurried home to their tiny
Eddy Street apartment, hustled up those slim steps, that
tight, private, back stairway, stripping off their clothing
even before reaching the little door at the top, rushing
inside almost all the way naked now, and celebrating their
love under Matisse's Odalisque.
My mom is in fact an artist. I wish I would have inherited
some of her talents. Sometimes my drawings satisfy me...
but seldom. I never studied in art school, but my
grandfather gave me lessons. I was ten. He was so patient,
so approving. I remember working on a watercolor from a
picture in a magazine--a two story house with pale yellow
wood and a purple roof. A slim young woman in a full dress
stood on the front walk proudly watching her husband and
small son trying out that first tricycle. My skills being
what they were, I completely omitted all people from the
painting, contenting myself with lawn, house, sky. The
water color was too thin to suit me. I wanted more
substantial color, thicker paint. "You're such a boy," my
grandfather scoffed good-naturedly, and then he took the
brush from my immature hand, waggled it in the water jar,
and showed me how it should go. "Just let the water do its
work," he said, "See, here's cement, here's the shadow of
this stair." It was amazing. Magic. "Don't overdo it,"
Grandfather cautioned. "Just a small bump to get the brain
going." But I didn't know what he meant; I always overdid
it.
In those days we often visited the museums. I was bored and
restless; I pretended to enjoy the paintings, but I was more
attracted to the velvet ropes, the frames, the fountains.
Still some of the art sank in to my small being. I don't
really know a lot about art. My mother studied the
paintings and sometimes sighed--she'd limited herself to
maybe two or three watercolors a year since kids had come
into her life. I was always on the lookout for her
favorites artists. "Who's the best, Mom?" I wanted to know.
My mother liked all the masters, not just Matisse and Van
Gogh. Utrillo moved her in some special way. Pissaro.
Monet. And she liked Rembrandt's light. I liked brighter
stuff and gore, ducks with broken necks dripping blood,
lions about to devour nudes. In my teens I turned to
Hopper. I loved those big blocks of heavy light, the way he
showed substantial color could be subtle. And so much sex,
of course. The first coffee table art book I ever bought
was the giant Abrahms Edward Hopper. I bought tubes of
acrylics and tried to understand Hopper's way with waves and
window shades as well as sturdier surfaces. I developed
appreciation but no skill. The first painting I ever wrote a
story about was Hopper's "Office at Night." (By the way, I
think the image is reversed in the web version.) I love
thinking about what these people are thinking.
Does this woman have a nice ass? Maybe she thinks it's a
little too big. Maybe she's proud of it. Are women proud
of their asses? Maybe the man is so used to it he doesn't
even see it. Or maybe undercurrents of lust pulse through
his body, but times being what they are, he must pretend to
be unaroused.
The thing that gets me about this painting is that the
moment extends so easily. What does the guy tell his wife
when he gets home? Not, probably, that a sudden evening
breeze blew through the open window, picked up a piece of
paper and floated it into the air, and that the document
eventually landed neatly on the floor next to his desk.
"It's okay, Cecelia," he said, swiveling his chair, "I'll
get it."
But she'd already knelt next to him, the crotch of his suit
trousers so close to her eyes, inches away. If she'd bend
forward she could mouth that little bulge of his penis
beneath the wool. Wool? Wool might be a little warm for
summer. And the fuzziness would feel funny against her
lips, but wouldn't it be fun to feel him fatten? The
puffing up under there, little lurches of excitement. "Let
me," she'd say, shifting her hand into the fly, unbuttoning
and going in. So warm and full his penis is, so full of
pulse. Something to admire, and then to suck, and then to
admire more. No, that's not a story any man would tell at
home, and it's probably not Hopper's story, either, but let
us not rule anything out.
Maybe my imagination more closely mimics hers. Cecelia's.
"If there's nothing else, then good night, Mr. Abrams," she
says.
"Good night, Cecelia," he answers.
Next thing you know she's slipping into her summer coat.
Stepping down the dim hallway to the elevator. Going down.
Were the city streets at night safer then than now? She
sits in the subway letting loose thoughts rattle. The quick
walk to her apartment. A smooth starless evening. No moon
but the moon-round streetlamp globes. Gray stoops. Black
wrought iron railings. A sturdy door. A heavy key. Three
floors up. A dish of milk for the gray cat. A few long
strokes along the spine while the cat laps. She lowers the
blinds, pulls up her dress, lies back in the stuffed chair,
lets her legs spread. Her half-slip slips up along her
upper thighs.
Mr. Abrams can't quite picture what happens next. Cecelia's
fingers tugging the heavy mat of pussy fur. Sex lips thick
and full, starting to open, nurslings of excitement, the shy
glisten of sexual seep. How long and hard will Cecelia have
to rub before she starts her come? Will she stay on the
surface, or slip a finger in? Two fingers?
Mr. Abrams moves his hand up and down. "I'm not going to
actually make myself come," he thinks. Maybe Mary will feel
better tonight. Maybe... But in the back of his mind he
hears Cecelia's cry. "Fuck my cunt," he hears. "Fuck my
fucking cunt and make me come. Oh yes, like that, make me
come. Make me come. Make me come, come, come." He milks
the creamy spew into his underwear. For the few seconds of
release there is contentment, satisfaction. The ease of
fresh emptiness. And then the smug disquiet of spilled
seed, sticky froth.
Meanwhile Cecelia has stopped short. She sits up. "Come
here, Pussykins," she says. The cat leaps effortlessly to
the arm of her chair and then eases into her lap. The
warmth of creature weight settles in, steady surges of slow
purring. "I think I'm getting my period soon," she says to
her cat, and then she cries.
At the file cabinet Cecelia turns to Mr. Abrams. "Do you
think maybe we could use some pictures in here? To liven
the place up a little?"
"Pictures? What kind of pictures."
"I don't know. Horses?"
"Mm," he says. "Horses. Have you ever ridden a horse?" An
image of Cecelia on horseback shoots before his eyes. The
horse is flying across a grassy meadow. Soggy and green as
Ireland in his imagination, clods of turf flying up,
Cecelia's black hair flying behind her--she's naked, astride
the dark horse, her big breasts bobbling in wildly serene
slow-motion, her legs spread so wide, wrapped around the
horse flesh, gripping, her center vee slamming up and down,
the snug mat of wild fleece rising and falling, so soft, so
tender, bare against the horse's back, bareback, clods of
earth flying up like clouds before a sudden storm.
"Horses," he repeats, stuck.
"I fed one once," Cecelia says. "The tongue tickled."
"Fed it what?" Abrams asks. "An apple?"
"A sugar cube."
"But you didn't ride?"
"No. I was afraid. The horse was so big."
"Yes, they are big," Abrams says.
Cecelia closes the file cabinet. "My daddy wanted to hoist
me up, but I wouldn't. I squirmed and fussed."
"My wife's uncle used to have a farm out in Jersey, back
before the war," Abrams says. "We went out there visiting
once."
"Did they have horses?" Cecelia asks, turning towards him.
"Chickens," Abrams says.
"Oh."
"Yeah, I guess you can't really ride chickens, can you?"
"I guess not."
"It was a nice farm though. The eggs were hot. Have you
ever felt a freshly laid egg?"
"No."
"There's something about it."
"Hot?"
"Yeah, hot. But there's something more."
"What?"
"I don't know. I guess you have to hold one in your hands
to know."
"I guess so."
"We never went back to the farm, though. And then her uncle
sold it."
"It wouldn't have to be horses," Cecelia says. "It could be
some other kind of art. In the Saturday magazine there was
this article about this painter Van Gogh."
"Oh, Van Gogh, I've heard of him."
"There were pictures of some of his paintings."
"Didn't he paint the Mona Lisa?"
"I'm not sure. I don't think it's one they mentioned. The
picture I liked was called Starry Night."
"I don't think I've heard of that one. What did you like
about it?"
"I don't know," Cecelia answers. "It's kind of hard to say.
It was... I don't know... Maybe it's like holding that just-
laid egg." In fact Cecelia does know why she liked Starry
Night. The painting made her feel like she feels in the
first moment of climax. The instant of surrender to the
wonders of bliss and breathlessness. Something vast and
concentrated, expanding and contracting, careless, precise,
completely out of control. She blushes, but Mr. Abrams
isn't watching. He has his head down, apparently intent on
finishing the document in front of him.
"Starry Night, eh?" Mr. Abrams says. "Maybe we can get it.
If we can, which wall do you think we should hang it on?"
"Oh, Mr. Abrams, you're teasing me. Starry Night is in some
museum someplace. It's probably not for sale."
"Oh," says Abrams. "Well you see I know nothing about art.
Nothing about art or horses."
"But you do know something about eggs."
Cecelia and Abrams both laugh. Small almost comfortable
laughs. At that instant the breeze comes up. A single
sheet of paper from the top of Abrams' desk swirls up into
the evening office air, hangs aloft for a long, frail
moment, and then shimmies downward, like a heavy seed in
search of that hard-to-find fertile soil. The page settles
on the floor an inch or two from Abrams. Cecelia takes a
tentative half step towards it.
But Abrams had already swiveled his chair. "It's okay," he
says. "I'll get it."
--Mat Twassel
The Links:
Your task of the week is to view the paintings linked below,
and using one of them as your inspiration, write a little piece,
story, vignette, caption, reaction, poem, or something which
you think might interest your fellow ASSDers.
Post your answer to the alt.sex.stories newsgroup of your choice.
http://www2.iinet.com/art/20th/american/hopper/hopper07.jpg
http://www2.iinet.com/art/20th/american/hopper/hopper08.jpg
http://www2.iinet.com/art/20th/american/hopper/hopper16.jpg
http://www2.iinet.com/art/20th/american/hopper/hopper17.jpg
http://www2.iinet.com/art/20th/american/hopper/hopper25.jpg
http://www2.iinet.com/art/20th/american/benton/benton02.jpg
Allison George
for suggesting the topic and providing the links. I would also salute the
other writers who turned in admirable efforts.
ciao,
Allison
tira...@my-dejanews.com
mmtw...@aol.com (Mmtwassel) wrote:
> Many thanks to all the contributors to "This Week's Quiz:
> the Hopper Collection." I don't see any reason not to let
> it go another week
Well, it has been more than a week, but I did like the idea so my "The Office
at Night" has now finally been posted to Ass and assm.
No sex, but I hope someone enjoys it anyway.
Tiramisu
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