Waiting for Hockney Page #2

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a slave to tradition.

For example, you're told

to see the hair as a shape.

Fair enough, that's what it is.

But it's also tens of thousands

of these little strands.

I'm the guy on the side saying,

"OK. I'm your cheerleader. I'm

the guy that's holding your hand."

So, I set out to draw

hair the way I see it,

the way we really see it.

Good. You're on the

right track. Keep going.

I would stare all day

at my hair in a mirror,

then I'd go pick up a

copy of Vogue', and...

then I'd come back and get my

mother or my sister to say, "Hey..."

"would you sit here a minute.

I just want to look at your hair."

I would stare all day at my hair in a mirror,

then I'd go pick up a copy of Vogue', and...

And then I'd go to my table and I'd have

a pencil in my hand and I'd be like...

And I'd go back and

look at some more hair.

I began to realize that I was about to

get involved with a

very big undertaking.

I need to put my full-time

existence into this,

or it will never get finished.

Some people are driven.

And some people have chauffeurs.

Larry and I discussed it and

he said, "Well, let's try this."

Billy needed the extra help to

driven a little bit, that's all.

So, every month he would give me an envelope

full of hundred dollar bills to keep me going.

And it was on the agreement that

I would give it back

when I could afford to.

So, I got my dream, which is to do this

project. And I got the backing to make it go.

But I realized that I had to teach myself how

to draw, practically all over again.

I had to totally break myself down,

and rebuild myself.

I had lip school...

teeth school...

not dentistry, this was 'teeth' school.

And there was a school

for each thing I did.

I wanted you to know that I knew,

that I really, really

knew what I was drawing.

We're doing something on new ground,

something that's beyond drawing.

Marilyn was 14 by 17.

But I worked within the area

of the period in the newspaper.

That's how small the area was.

I would say, "OK, that's light

enough, that's dark enough,

that is part of an edge, that is not...

move on to the next area."

On a good day, I would get

which would sometimes

take 15 hours to do.

This is where we're going.

We're on to something here.

The hair took 2 years.

That's 365 times 2. You get up, you

draw hair all day and you go to bed.

"How many marks have you made

today, Billy? What have you done?"

Imagine how some people who know

and love me felt who never saw it.

"He's been working

on what for how long?"

He would really go into hiding we would call

it, you know, that he's going underground.

And then when you see him, you know, "What

have you been doing for the last eight months?"

"Um, her right eye." And

you're like going "OK..."

People would say to me, "Well, what

is with Marilyn? You know, what?"

And I'd say, "Listen, you're

asking me? Don't ask me."

I said, "All I know is, picture somebody

working for 800 hours on a mouth."

"How can anybody work

for 800 hours on a mouth?"

I mean, my own friends didn't believe

what I had going on in my life this long.

"Oh, he's drawing Marilyn

Monroe." It just sounds too insane.

He was sitting there on Christmas

Eve, and he's going into detail

about drawing Marilyn's lips.

And he's so excited

that he's like, "Jeff...

"...I can make my lips look

exactly like Marilyn Monroe."

I'm having these pictures of him

being like this cross-dressing psycho,

and he's trying to tell me, you

know, this technical process.

And he's like, "Look man, what

an a**hole you are." He goes,

"This is how committed I am to my art."

All of his girlfriends have

been brunettes, dark hair,

until he met Marilyn.

And now he's had an affair with

Marilyn for 10 years.

I mean, I started signing cards, you know,

"Merry Christmas. Love ya. Billy and Marilyn."

I've seen people who

work hard all my life.

But what he's done, is just, I, I

can't, sometimes I can't bear to watch it.

There were some days where I'd work

all day and I, I would I would do well.

But then the next day

I'd come to work and

there were times where I couldn't

quite notice what I did yesterday.

It was like spit in the ocean.

You know, even where he says, "I

only have the size of a dime left."

Well, you would think someone could

fill in the space of a dime in an hour.

Well, Billy, it would

take him two months.

I think only geology

moves slower than me,

when I'm doing my work, right? I mean,

hair grows faster than I draw,

trees grow faster, everything gro...

...everything happens faster except

maybe mountains forming or eroding.

I didn't come to this with,

with all the problems solved.

I came to it with an idea and

learned to ease the pain

I had in my body every day.

I tried to make sure Billy

didn't jump of the bridge

or take up another profession

like knitting or something.

The slings for my arms...

...I didn't start working this way I

would say till about four years into it.

And now I don't know how I held

my arms up like this for four years.

When he was doing Marilyn and

he was working on it for years,

you know, you're kind of waiting,

waiting, and waiting and uh,

it's like, you know, will

this thing ever happen?

Eight years. Eight years.

The guy could have graduated

from medical school by now.

I addressed every

single speck of that paper

with that kind of intensity and focus.

Billy is one of the most

rock-solid people I've ever met.

Billy is like a laser beam.

There were no down

moments in this thing.

Everything is 'hit it hard',

like my life depends on it.

Let's let everything go

to hell, except excellence.

Excellence at any cost.

Where it says 'NYU', Bill.

OK?

OK.

Hardly anyone even knows I finished

it. I haven't gone public with it yet.

That's where I am.

The work itself is complete.

Getting to the people to move it on, that's

critical, that's crucial, that's so important.

We need help from people.

Larry and I assembled my dream team.

Well there was myself.

Impresario, friend,

buddy, Dr. Lifestyle...

I'm just there.

My wife, Stephanie,

who is his archivist.

Basically to take notes

and take photographs.

I have the director of

a museum, Gary Vikan.

He's done an Olympic thing.

It is enormously,

technically sophisticated.

It is a way of demonstrating

how good you are.

And, Brother Rene is our administrator.

Brother Rene has the prestige of being

head of a very large private school.

Um, my experience with those people

are they are movers and shakers.

And uh, how, you know... he's done

this very unusual creative work...

and also to kind of, uh...

He has the infrastructure. He has the exper...

Yeah alright, it's only a high school, but...

there are a lot of powerful people sitting

behind the desks running high schools.

None of us is trained

for this Billy Pappas stuff.

Considering that everyone is helping

out because they care about me...

and because I asked them...

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