Waiting for Hockney Page #7

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Billy started explaining the

process and how he'd done it...

Personally, I didn't try

to show any disappointment

but I was a little bit

underwhelmed immediately.

But it wasn't about me.

It was about David.

And I thought that I'd leave

David and Billy and his friends

and so I went down the hill

to the Polo Lounge actually

and had lunch with a girlfriend of mine.

Nice lunch.

I don't even think I brought it up

what was happening today.

It was just a day in the

life in the Hollywood Hills.

When I got back after lunch, I said,

"Well, what did you

think of everything?" And,

I think, sooner or

later it got around to,

you know, it's a line I've

heard David say many, many times:

"It's still that f***ing photograph."

It didn't turn David on.

I did think that there was a

big naivet on the part of Billy.

It's the naivet of not

understanding how the art world works.

It's just not, that's not his world.

For one thing, I think,

"Why did he pick Marilyn Monroe?"

The most famous icon image

of the twentieth century.

Secondly, the choice that it's

based on a photographic image.

We don't like the picture

that a photograph makes.

It is flat. It's boring. It's static.

So much of David's ideas

and my own ideas about

photography and its limitation

have to do with getting outside

of the box of photography.

Three, that the human eye can't

scrutinize the things

without aid of a microscope.

If you put it on a wall in a

museum or a gallery somewhere,

would you know any

of things that we know

that went into this drawing

by looking at it yourself.

And then lastly,

I think his assumptive ground that David

would be this great mentor for his work,

would you know any of

the things that we know

went into this drawing

by looking at it yourself?

Uh... was an assumptive ground

that ended up being untrue.

There was no way that,

David could live up to

the projected fantasies that

Billy had for the meeting.

Somebody at a bar

could have explained

Billy to Billy better than Hockney did

and I don't think Billy

would have heard it.

Or would have been as prepared to hear

it as he was to hear it from Hockney.

There's a chance that

if Hockney had burped,

that he would have thought

that Hockney explained him.

You know, who we pick

as our mentors are not always the people

that are in our best interests.

David did make a funny

aside, he said to Billy,

"Have you ever thought about

doing a quicker sketch?"

To the extent that he had decided,

and it seemed like he had,

that entire value of

ten years of his work

was going to hang in the balance of what

Hockney's estimation of it was,

that was way, way,

way, way, way too much

authority to be giving Hockney.

And...

You shouldn't give that

kind of authority to anybody.

This is the dictionary.

There's just a couple of words...

I was thinking about.

I just wanted to make sure that I...

was thinking about them properly.

I travel with at least one dictionary.

Lately, I've had about

three on me, usually.

I'm pretty obsessed with words.

How're you doing? Hi.

I'm wondering if you were

looking for any bartenders?

Right now? Yeah.

You never know when, so I'll

give you an application and...

OK. OK.

I'm interested...

...in applying for a job as a bartender.

You know, I feel like I'm

everywhere and nowhere.

I have a portrait,

but I don't really have a career.

Yet.

I really don't. I mean...

I'm an artist, but...

I'm not a working artist.

I've never been an

artist making a living.

Now I have borrowed a lot of money.

You know, I think it's

about, it's about $300,000.

Do you think I can pay

that back tending bar?

I'm so far out on a limb.

I mean, I can't get the last

fifteen years of my life back.

I'll be pushing forty.

I think this is just a mere setback.

I'm just looking for some cash...

until the phone rings.

So, I don't think about...

that would be failure.

I don't think about failure too much.

Now that Marilyn is finished,

I especially don't think

of failure too much.

Failure's for losers.

Is it that way?

We all decide on how we

want to spend this life.

Some people decide to devote

it to their children...

some people decide to devote

it to their art, but...

How do you value that work?

Of everything it can be said,

and specifically of works of art,

everything is...

the value of everything is

somewhere between

worthless and priceless.

I don't think for a second

the money that Billy Pappas

might end up with in his pocket

is what this is about.

The only thing that's interesting is the

pillow of air that you have in your mouth,

as a viewer.

Where you get this pillow

of air lodged in your mouth,

and you notice that...

you haven't breathed

for, for twenty seconds.

Now I had that looking at that.

I understand the role of validation, and

having other people appreciate your work,

but...

you can't let that define you either.

He alone can judge

what is validation after investing

Marilyn is his.

He has done Marilyn.

No one - except our Lord -

can take that away from him.

He's just spent ten years

doing something marvelous.

He should feel satisfaction.

Stop worrying about Bill Gates.

Stop worrying about David Hockney.

Think about what happens next.

I've been here five months.

I didn't realize how

much I needed this...

until I got here.

It's been great for me.

I'll never forget the first night,

I came home with forty

dollars in my pocket.

I mean, here I'm 37 years old,

and I'm driving home and I'm like,

"Wow, forty bucks man!"

I'm like, "I earned this."

It just felt so good...

to...

have this money come to me,

the way it comes to most of us.

With regard to my plan for Marilyn

and Hockney and everything...

I had big ideas.

And, I mean, my world

quickly turned pretty... dark.

But, you know, just

don't think about that.

Just remember what a fortune

it is to be able to draw...

imagine how you'd feel

if one day you woke up,

and you couldn't do it.

The last couple of months

I've been working on a self-portrait.

I don't particularly like

self-portraits because it's...

it's difficult for me to pose

and draw at the same time, it...

it's not like I have a philosophical

aversion to doing self-portraits.

I think everything I

do is a self-portrait.

I'm not finished my head, but...

the rest of it is finished.

I'm excited about it,

excited to see how it's

going to turn out...

how I may surprise myself.

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