Art on Fire (25 page)

In 1987 alone, Francesca's work exhibited in seven national shows and two international ones. Most notably, she'd been special guest (read: sole United States citizen) at the lauded Women's Work exhibition at the National Museum in Canada; several of her paintings hung in a show titled “The Women” at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City and were also included in the New Women Artists Celebration in Berlin.

What's more, she had attracted a fanatically devoted following of
college students—
deSilvans
—who traversed the country to see her paintings “live,” convening in parking lots to exchange photographs of her work, tidbits about her career, and gossip. They distributed buttons, T-shirts, and bumper stickers on which were printed “deSilva: The Art Your Government Warned You About.” Such devotion to a visual artist was unprecedented, earning Francesca deSilva the honor of being the first painter—finally, not just the first “female” painter—to bridge the gap between art and pop culture.
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She was a frequent speaker at universities and colleges and, in an effort to “keep things fresh,” taught introductory summer sessions at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Mass.

Even so, Francesca's lack of education and her taciturn, often defiant manner brought out the worst in many of those who were in a position to boost her career, namely critics and scholars. Her paintings frequently inspired skepticism and elitist criticism, much of which seemed designed to scare the young artist away from the canvas.
⁶⁶
She was accused of relying upon the occurrence of “accident” to give her paintings “meaning,”
⁶⁷
an insult, deSilva noted in her 1989 interview with Michael Reilly of the
Village Voice
, also leveled at Jackson Pollock after he'd ingeniously dripped paint on a giant canvas instead of relying on the paintbrush. deSilva paraphrased Pollock's response to the peevish reporter's accusation: “Echoing the great Jackson Pollock's response to that question,” she said, “I do not
use
the accident . . . I deny the accident.”
⁶⁸

Underestimating her prodigy's stubborn preference for privacy and squalor, Charlotte Wallace had the barn behind her house remodeled. She installed a sleeping loft, indoor plumbing, and a catalytic wood stove; had two cords of kiln-dried logs piled tidily behind the structure, all to persuade Francesca to abandon her unsavory cabin (a place Charlotte considered unworthy of Francesca's art supplies, never mind her person) and take up residence somewhere suitable to an artist of acclaim, which, Charlotte often repeated, Francesca was.

But Francesca insisted on living and working in the 12' x 16' cabin. The cabin was her home, the site where her real life had begun. What Francesca could not say was that there, in the dark privacy, amid scampering mice and spiders that dangled boldly from the ceiling, she
closed the door and remembered herself. There, she was unalterable, certain she existed apart from the art world and the female fans, the intrusive memories of her crazy sister, her perennial sadness about Lisa, the rejection she'd suffered at the hands of her family. In the cabin, the unloved, barely tolerated, unexceptional child reappeared, the child whose greatest achievement was her ability to build a hut. Though the public possessed some fleeting curiosity about her, wanting to pry her apart as if she were a preserved frog on a slim glass slide, Francesca knew not to become attached to this. People, she had learned long ago, were fickle and cruel.

So, though the painting was good and though she felt, when she was painting, that she had been born for a good reason, not just to flail about for fifty, sixty—
please, let it be no more
—years in torment, things hadn't changed so much. She still wanted to stay where she couldn't be found, and sometimes she remained inside the small, dark room for days at a time—painting or sleeping or staring at some fixed point on the wall. In the cabin she did not have to pretend at schooling or privilege or knowledge of the great movements in art history. She could lounge on the bottom bunk smoking cigarettes, feeling grungy and empty inside. In the cabin when she turned out the lights, she was herself again—the shell of a human being, all the image and fantasy and notoriety swallowed by ordinary darkness.

Her opening at the Wallace Gallery had pulled in over $20,000, leaving her enough to live on for at least a year. Plus, paintings continued to sell, fetching at least $15,000 each; they did not sell quickly, but when they did, enthusiasts were willing to pay top dollar. Thus, there was no more shoveling snow or selling knick-knacks for Francesca. Still, she missed her old life—the insecurity and endless solitude; the long, unrelegated nights. Occasionally she broke through her embarrassment at her good fortune and stopped by the flea market where she met with a flurry of slapping hugs and stories about the old days, tales for the benefit of newcomers: “You should have seen her when she walked in here . . .” and “You'd never have known she was a genius by looking at that one.” Good-hearted, well-intentioned insults that scratched like the thorns on branches—not too deeply, just enough to make her rub her arms and be glad when it was over.

Except for the occasional suit she had to wear when attending dreaded dinners with collectors or curators, Francesca's life as a painter fitted her brilliantly. Rarely were there even small moments—cleaning brushes, brushing her teeth, sweeping the floor of the cabin—when she was without gratitude for the favorable shift in her fortune. Her years in New Haven seemed farther and farther away, the house on Riverview Street demure as a tiny island from which she'd floated in a small boat. She noted with bittersweet relief that each day she thought less of Lisa. Lisa's intense face or small hands or some tough, flippant comment she'd made, the quickening of her breath during sex, her rings moving in the night like lightning bugs as she lit up a joint—these things appeared only two or three times a week instead of hourly. Now, when she encountered some interesting sight or overheard a tidbit of unsettling conversation, she kept it entirely to herself rather than filing it away or jotting it down to share with Lisa at some later date. She no longer inhaled deeply each time she passed the scent store on Commercial Street, searching out the aroma of lavender oil that reminded her of love. When she painted and the painting was good, the ideas leapt from inside her fully formed, larvae transformed into butterflies, anxious to be freed from the soft cage of her brain.

She began to recall quieter aspects of her childhood, details more curious than unpleasant. She remembered her odd habit of getting lost in the supermarket, her strategy of gazing straight ahead at the forest of ladies' hands rather than up at faces where she might have efficiently distinguished her mother's dark hair and narrow features. While wandering the aisles of the store, she was driven more by curiosity than panic, trying to recall the specifics of her mother's fingers. Halfheartedly, she'd conjure the small diamond engagement ring and slim gold band, the raisin enamel that coated Vivian's trimmed fingernails.

She'd wind up at the front desk, sucking a lollipop or nibbling on a cookie while some awkward man tried to describe her over the intercom:
We have a lost little girl named Francesca. She's eight years old with brown hair. If this is your little child, please come to Customer Service
. In the time between the announcement and her mother's arrival, she'd rough out her new life in an orphanage—a dank, puddly
basement where hundreds of ugly children spoke with British accents. At least she would have company.

Or she'd imagine that her mother had run off and she'd been sent to live with Evelyn. Or she was adopted by the awkward man at the grocery store and his blond wife. (She knew nothing about the man's wife, but always imagined everyone's wife to be blond. Nice mothers, too: blond. Unlike her own. The wives of Francesca's imagination were fair and pleasant, like kind, aging princesses from fairy tales.) If there were to be siblings in her new home, they would be male and athletic. (No geniuses.) Together, they'd play tetherball after dinner, pounding the yellow ball until its cord strangled a shady oak in the backyard. Or ride bicycles in the turnaround at the end of the road. If she fell down and scraped her skin, there would be Mercurochrome and a Band-Aid.

Then, just as she'd begun to chisel from her imagination the specifics of her new life, her mother would arrive in the little Customer Service control tower, breathless, exuding sweet concern and thanking the man for his trouble. On the way home, they'd stop at Dairy Queen, even if it were nearly dinner time, where Francesca would be offered a soft serve in lieu of an apology.

Francesca continued to see Shanta Wall during the year that followed her opening, though she never considered the relationship to be anything more than a protracted summer fling. She steadfastly restricted their time together to two or three nights a week and, further, only nights when she felt like fucking and sleeping instead of painting. Mornings after staying at Shanta's luxury condo she'd take a hot shower that would have to last until her next visit (unless she used Charlotte's facilities in the meantime), and bicycle home through the silent streets, the smell of oil paint on her skin mingling with the aroma of early morning coffee brewing in the Provincetown restaurants and the sweet fat frying inside Portuguese bakeries.

Shanta was so beautiful and she smelled of all sorts of interesting, expensive scents. Her wardrobe was filled with tight-fitting garments
that seemed to have been tailored for her fleshy, ample form. But it was painting, not sex, that Francesca craved.
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And all the painting she did, combined with the large continent of her heart occupied by Lisa, did not leave much left over. Thus, anytime they discussed the possibility of Francesca abandoning the cabin (her landlord had increased the rent to $65 a month, well aware of the change in Francesca's circumstances) and living at Shanta's condo, Francesca felt as if someone were tightening a clamp around her chest. The sensation began as a tight little cough, almost like the onset of a flu, and ended with Francesca, inarticulate and angry, gasping for air on the balcony, dragging on a cigarette.

Shanta had never been permitted to visit the cabin and this, more than any other of Francesca's rules and peculiarities designed to maintain a stiff distance between them, she found offensive. Francesca knew it was perfectly reasonable for Shanta to wish to visit the cabin—
at least once
! They were lovers, after all, and Shanta wanted to see where it all happened. Finally, Francesca agreed to a visit. They scheduled it on the evening of an obligatory extravaganza; this way, Francesca figured, there would be a time limit. Shanta would pick up Francesca at the cabin, as usual, but this time, instead of waiting in the car, she'd come in.

“But you can not,” Francesca insisted, pointing her finger, “comment on the paintings. In fact, I want you to act like you don't even see them.”

Shanta agreed. “Sure, sure. Of course, baby,” she said, immediately dismissing all instructions. How would it be possible to enter such a tiny room, filled to the brim with paintings completed by the most brilliant artist she'd ever known, and not take a peek?

Francesca hung her tuxedo on the metal bedpost, filled the espresso maker, and lit the stove. She left a cigarette burning in the ashtray while she brushed her teeth, spit out her toothpaste, and inspected her face in the cheap mirror that hung from a nail. Her hair was unruly, if reasonably clean. But no matter how mightily she scrubbed her fingers, they were stained grayish red, paint stuck like street tar under her nails. Oh well.

She unwrapped the tux from its stiff, plastic bag, slid the pants on, chose a clean running bra and undershirt, dusted off the starched shirt
and buttoned it carefully up the front. She clipped on the bow tie and fussed with her cummerbund, pulling on the jacket just as Shanta's Saab came to a stop alongside the cabin. Shanta yanked up on the emergency brake. Keys jangled. Doc Martens thumped over the train tracks, along the gritty, pebbly ground toward the door. “Hello?” she called.

“Come in,” said Francesca stepping back to the edge of the room, pressing her hot mug of coffee to her chin.

Quietly, reverently, Shanta entered the dark cabin. She wore low-slung jeans and a tight gold top. Her dark, short hair glistened in the late afternoon light. Her lips were coated in thick blackberry gloss.

“Is that what you're wearing?” Francesca asked, gesturing.

Shanta shook her head. “I have three dresses in the car. I want to see which one you like best.”