He led me to the adjoining room, where Krzysio was waiting. ‘I can’t believe they paid her to do this,’ he said with an amused shake of his head. He tugged at a skein of wool that was hanging loose from his jumper.
The wall behind him was covered with black and white photographs. When I examined them I recognised parts of Wrocław: the town square with its jumble of gothic and art nouveau buildings, the dark entrance to the Rura Club, the congested street leading to Krzysio’s apartment. Małgorzata was in all the photos but she was often captured in the distance or out of focus. In one photo she was depicted from behind, her curls haloed by a street lamp. In another she stood outside a kiosk holding a match to a cigarette. The photos had a voyeuristic quality; somehow they felt intimate and anonymous at the same time. I checked the title of the exhibit, This Experiment Has Been Done Before.
Małgorzata was a few metres away, talking to an older couple. When she saw me she hurried over, a bottle of beer in her hand and a pair of old-fashioned pilot goggles perched on her head. ‘What do you think of the photos?’ Her words came out breathy and fast.
‘They’re good,’ I said. ‘Really good. But there’s something odd about them …’
‘Yes?’
I took in her look of anticipation and paused, figuring out how to phrase my discomfort. ‘These photos …’ I started. ‘Well, they make me feel like I’m intruding on a private moment. Does that make sense?’
Małgorzata clapped her hands together. ‘That’s exactly it.’
‘Go on,’ Dominik said. ‘Tell her.’
‘I put myself under surveillance.’ She sounded inordinately pleased. ‘For two weeks I was followed by complete strangers. I didn’t know who they were or what they looked like. But as you can see, they knew where to find me.’
I considered the photos in this new light. It was a bold concept for an exhibition – and it worked. ‘Did you catch any of your stalkers in the act?’ I asked.
‘A few times.’ Małgorzata pointed to a photo in which she was sitting on a bench, running her fingers through her hair. She was clearly aware of being watched and seemed to enjoy it. However, another photo caught her looking vulnerable, about to cross the street with a loaf of bread threatening to topple out of her grip, her mouth open.
‘I wanted to document the effects that being watched has on the citizen,’ Małgorzata said. ‘All of us are under surveillance all the time. We know it and we get on with our lives. But how does it affect our psyches, how does it shape our sense of self? That’s what I’m interested in.’
Dominik chuckled and clamped a hand on her shoulder. ‘I told you that you don’t need me to spin that arty bullshit on your behalf. You’re quite capable of doing it yourself.’
She grinned and bowed, one hand in a mock salute by her pilot glasses.
‘And the censors?’ Krzysio asked.
‘I told them it was an allegory about the so-called Cold War. You know, I’m Poland and the photographers are the United States.’
‘They believed that?’ I asked.
‘Our Małgorzata knows how to get things done,’ Dominik said. Just as I was bristling at the use of this familiarity – our Małgorzata – he looped his arm around my waist. ‘It’s your turn next, Ania. You’ll be exhibiting here soon.’
I tilted my head to meet his kiss. As we broke away, a middle-aged man strode towards us. He wore American-style jeans and a brown pressed shirt and tie. Beside him, the rest of us looked particularly scruffy. Except Małgorzata. For some reason, her rumpled clothes enhanced her beauty.
‘Janusz,’ Małgorzata greeted him.
He kissed her on both cheeks and then briefly on the lips. ‘I’ll be at the Poza Nawiasem later tonight. Join me for a drink.’ He smoothed the parting of his hair and gave the rest of us a well-practised smile. ‘Your friends are welcome too.’
When he was out of earshot, Małgorzata said, ‘Darling Janusz. I love working with him.’
‘He’s her favourite censor.’ Dominik jerked his thumb towards the departing Janusz. ‘Lets her get away with murder and then buys her drinks to celebrate.’
‘Poor man never made it as an artist,’ Małgorzata said. ‘For him this is the next best thing.’ A few metres away, Janusz was standing in front of a sculpture made of tin cans. He was talking to a young woman and gesturing to various parts of the sculpture, as though explaining it.
The tin can sculpture, the cubes, Małgorzata’s photos – these were far from traditional. And yet here they were displayed in a gallery. I was beginning to see that being an artist didn’t mean I had to copy the masters. What I did have to do was create something that belonged to me – something that no one else could make. I got a jolt as I realised that this was what Professor Jankowski had meant when he said we needed to acquire our own artistic vision.
There was one thing I didn’t understand about the photographs. I pointed to the piece of card on the wall. ‘This Experiment Has Been Done Before,’ I read. ‘What does it mean?’
‘I’m not quite sure,’ Małgorzata said. ‘That was Janusz’s doing. I wanted to call it Police State but he said absolutely not. Anyway his title is better, isn’t it? More enigmatic.’
8
I had always thought of artists as a breed of people who were different from me. People who, through a combination of talent and hard work, created things that had the power to move you, things that altered your perception of the world in some fundamental way.
Now that I was surrounded by them, the awe I’d felt in their presence was starting to shift into something else. I was starting to think: if they can do it, why can’t I?
Whether she knew it or not, Małgorzata was teaching me as much about art as I was learning at the Academy. Through her, I could see how I might carve out a life for myself as an artist. And for the next week, Małgorzata’s life – or at least, her glamorous apartment – was within my reach. She and her husband were travelling to Łódź for one of his films and she’d given Dominik the keys to their place.
He was already there, waiting. Eager to see him, I stuffed clothes into a satchel while my roommate Ewa watched on. She was leaning against the dresser, painting her nails a creamy pink. ‘Be careful,’ she said. ‘You know how to protect yourself against babies, don’t you?’ She screwed the top back on the polish and then shook it, the steel ball clicking in its pool of varnish.
‘Of course.’ I selected a pair of plain white underwear, wishing I had something fancier. What I did with Dominik was none of her business. Besides, he was going to make things safe for us. It was all about timing, he said. ‘I’ll see you in a week,’ I told her. ‘And if the dorm supervisors ask–’
‘You’ve gone home to visit your father,’ Ewa supplied.
‘Exactly.’
The city was fragrant with the overtures of spring. I walked through Wyspa Słodowa, a small islet near the old town, where the acacia trees were in bloom. The cool smell of water was all around me. I walked over an iron bridge, emerging on a busy street, and located the salmon-coloured building where Małgorzata lived. She was lucky. Her husband, Ryszard Wiater, did a lot of work for the State. While most other married couples I’d heard of had to wait ten, even twenty years, for their own place, Małgorzata and her husband had apparently acquired one straight away.
A muffled hello from the buzzer and the front door unclicked. I didn’t bother waiting for the lift, propelling myself up the seven flights of stairs instead.
‘Aniusieńka.’ Dominik kissed me as we stood on the landing. He then pulled me inside. ‘What do you want to do? We could go to the Rura Club, see who’s there.’
‘Is that really what you want?’
‘No,’ he said with a chuckle. ‘But I have to be a gentleman, don’t I?’
Our bodies pressed together and I slipped my hand under Dominik’s jumper. Traced the cool xylophone of his ribs.
That night we took a bath, indulging in the luxury of hot water. Our legs intertwined and Dominik
massaged my feet as he told me about his childhood in Warsaw. His father was a civil servant who took Dominik and his younger brother to concerts at the National Philharmonic and to Berlin for summer holidays. Despite these privileges, his childhood hadn’t been happy. His father was strict, Dominik said. Sometimes violent. He and his brother couldn’t wait to get away.
‘And your mother?’ I asked.
‘She’s gone.’ His fingers went still and then he resumed massaging my foot. ‘She took off with another man when my brother and I were young. We were tying her down, apparently.’ There was a tightness in his lips as he smiled. ‘She used to visit, from time to time. But then she started a new family, and …’ He felt around the edge of the bathtub. ‘Where’s the soap?’
‘My mother’s gone too. She died when I was a couple of months old. Her heart wasn’t getting enough blood.’ I trailed my palm through the water and said, ‘It was the pregnancy that caused it.’
There was a heavy exhale from Dominik. He cradled my face in his hands. ‘I bet that as soon as she saw you, she fell madly in love. I bet that she wouldn’t have given up those two months with you for anything in the world.’ With his thumb, he wiped the inner corners of my eyes.
Something shifted inside me and I drew him closer, kissing the soft mound of his lips and the rough stubble on his cheek, my knees knocking against the sides of the bath.
9
Dominik stretched out in bed. I rested my hand on the taut skin of his stomach, the narrow dip of his chest. A warmth flowed through me, reaching down to my toes. He gave a loud snore, the noise startling him awake. When he caught me watching he blinked and gave me a sleepy smile and then drew me into his arms.
‘I have to go to the studio,’ I said, kissing the line of his jaw.
‘And I have to work at the paper.’ He shifted, dislodging his arm from under my back before resting his body on mine.
The easy weight of him weakened my resolve. It didn’t matter. Things in the studio weren’t going well and it would be good to take some time out. I caressed the back of Dominik’s shoulders. ‘Be careful,’ I reminded him. ‘We don’t want to end up with a baby.’
‘Don’t we?’ His mouth wandered down to my stomach, the top of my thigh. ‘We’re going to get married anyway, aren’t we?’ he said. ‘I’ll be a proper writer and you’ll do your art and we’ll have three – no – four children.’
A light slap on his back. ‘You’re fast.’
‘Why not?’ He propped himself up, resting his elbows on either side of my thighs. ‘I don’t believe in all this existential bullshit. There’s no point in worrying about the meaning of life when it’s always been the same: get married and have children. Enjoy good meals and good sex. Get drunk.’
‘And I thought you were a revolutionary.’
‘I am. But I’m also a good Polish boy.’
I laughed and told him I would guard his secret. Despite my teasing, I let myself imagine it. Dominik and me. All the things we would make together: the home and the children. The books and the food and the art.
When I finally returned to the studio, my hands fumbled with the clay. I’d been away for too long, and I was inert and out of place. My jaw tightened as I contemplated my piece. After going to exhibitions of other people’s work, I understood that what I’d made was no good. What’s more I understood why. I was trying to be an Artist instead of being myself. I took a few steps back. Heavy with the realisation that it couldn’t be saved, I gave the sculpture a shove. It toppled over. With my knuckles, I pounded out its human shape.
There was a low whistle in the room and one of the boys approached. Legs splayed in his corduroy pants. ‘I guess that’s a woman’s prerogative – to change her mind.’
‘And now that you’ve painted a pair of breasts, you know all about women?’ I glanced at his painting of a Picasso-esque female nude reclining in a bath. One green breast bulged by her chin and a yellow one pointed in the direction of her shoulder.
He sniffed. ‘I know enough.’ He returned to his canvas and dabbed some paint on the woman’s thigh.
That afternoon, Professor Jankowski wandered in for one of his tours. My heart skittered as he drew near and I wondered how to explain my lack of progress. I straightened up, preparing for another round of humiliation. However, when he saw the unshapen clay he simply nodded. ‘You’re taking a new approach? That’s good. It means you’re learning from your mistakes.’ He adjusted his glasses. ‘This time don’t think so much.’
‘I’ll try. Or maybe it’s better that I don’t try?’ My laugh was unbearably girlish.
‘You know how to do this. I was impressed by your portfolio. Your sculptures had a certain rawness to them.’
How awful that he could remember my early attempts at art. ‘Those weren’t any good.’
‘That’s where you’re wrong. They had something in them,’ he said. ‘Go back to that. Follow your instincts.’
For the next couple of weeks I went to the studio every chance I could, often staying until two or three in the morning. Much of my time was spent looking at the clay or out the window at the meagre square of sky. When I began to work in earnest, the clay took on a form I hadn’t expected. It became a tall, narrow block and assumed the features of stretched-out eyes and lips. I kept moulding it, shaping it. Listening to what it had to say. In time I realised it was Mother. My dream version of her, pieced together not from memories, but from vague sensations and smells, from Father’s stories and our visits to the cemetery. My hands worked quickly. It was as though I had discovered a hidden language – bolder and more eloquent than the one I used in everyday life.
Although it was late, I didn’t want to go back to the university dorm, to the chatter about clothes and exams. I fetched a withered teabag from the heater and dipped it into a glass of hot water. The bag had been used so many times that it browned the liquid without giving it taste. I squeezed it, trying to extract more flavour. As I did so, footsteps reverberated in the room, releasing fast shallow creaks in the wooden floor. It was the sound of Dominik. I recognised the way that, in his haste to get where he was going, he pushed forward on his toes and put little weight on his heels.
‘Aniusieńka, what are you doing here, sitting by yourself in the cold?’ He crouched beside me.
‘It’s not finished yet.’ I smoothed the outer edge of the sculpture, trying to obscure his vision.
He moved my hand away. There was an uncharacteristic stillness in him as he examined the piece. Finally he said, ‘It’s her, isn’t it?’
I nodded.
‘I thought so. When I look at it, I can feel how much you care for her. You’ve put everything into this – all your sweetness and longing and sorrow.’ He traced a smear of clay on my wrist. ‘I love how fearless you are in your work.’
My whole body loosened with relief.
We contemplated the sculpture, his hand warming mine. Then he said, ‘You won’t believe what Małgorzata’s got up her sleeve.’ With a laugh, he told me what she had planned.
Surely he was joking. ‘Isn’t that illegal?’ I asked.
‘Probably. But if anyone can get away with it, she can.’ Dominik helped me up from the floor. Standing close, he bent down to kiss me and I reached up to meet him, pulling at the shoulders of his jacket. ‘I’ll walk you back to your dormitory,’ he said in a low voice. ‘Unless you want to come home with me?’
‘Your family …’
Dominik sighed and picked up my satchel from the floor. Lights out in the studio, I locked the door behind us. Leaving Mother in the room, her clay heart beating in the darkness.
10
This was the first time I’d been back to Małgorzata’s place since Dominik and I had stayed there, and I had to remind myself the apartment was no longer ours. Dominik was also readjusting. He wrapped his arms around my waist as I rinsed a glass in the sink. ‘Remember?’ He pointed to the bathroom. ‘The night we ended up on the floor and that tile cracked under our wei
ght.’
I shushed him. If Małgorzata had noticed the broken tile she hadn’t said anything about it. ‘Pour the vodka,’ I said. Though it was only morning, we needed fortification for what Małgorzata had in store.
Today was May Day, the international day of the workers. Anyone employed by the State had to march in a parade to show what a perfect socialist society we lived in. It was a chore that Father and I always escaped as he had no employer but himself. Dominik assured me that the parades were as tedious as they sounded. He told me that, like most people, his father would sign a paper at the beginning of the parade to prove he’d been there. Then he would sneak off to enjoy the rest of the holiday. As I picked up another glass to dry it, Dominik explained that Małgorzata wanted to ridicule the May Day tradition by staging a performance on her balcony. While the workers took part in the parade, she was going to indulge in two leisurely acts: reading and self-pleasure.
‘I know we’ve been over it, but I still don’t understand the point of this,’ I said.
He poured the shots and then licked some vodka off his thumb. ‘You’re not supposed to understand it. It’s avant-garde.’
‘If you say so.’ I placed a shot glass in each of his palms and one in my own, then we joined Krzysio on the balcony.
Seven floors below, the preparations had begun. Banners were unrolled and placards handed out. A news crew emerged from a green van. They set up a tripod and a video camera with a square eye.
‘Aren’t you glad we’re not workers?’ Dominik said, leaning on the railing.
‘Look at that guy.’ Krzysio pointed to an overweight man who was giving orders to a couple of people in caps. I could just catch the fat man’s words, Hold it straight. Straight, I said!
A man in aviator sunglasses plonked himself on the kerb and shaded himself with a portrait of Lenin. He balanced the black-and-white print on top of his head, his fingers clutching Lenin’s ears.
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