Tag Archives: art dealers

Let’s Get Sleazy!

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SoHo SinsI need a bath. Maybe a shower too. And some steel wool. I might never feel clean again. But that’s kind of the point of reading pulp, to slither through filthy streets, vicariously partake of forbidden fruit and get really, really slimy.

The Hard Case Crime books are a contemporary series of pulp / detective / noir books, some reprints of old stories, some newly written ones. Many are gems. Today we look at a brand spankin’ new hard case, a trashy, delicious, disgusting, amazing story by first-time novelist Richard Vine called SoHo Sins.

I read a lot of pulp. Truth be told, there’s not a lot of variety in the genre. The beauty typically comes in the language, the prose. Stories tend to borrow liberally from the tried-and-true, with minor variations. Not so for SoHo Sins. What I like about this book is the ways in which it stretches the standard pulp template. The main character/narrator is a wealthy art dealer, not a detective (neither professional nor amateur). He is close friends with a P.I. but their friendship is never explained nor explored (which I quite enjoy). This P.I. asks the art dealer for help in investigating a murder that on the surface seems to be an open-and-shut case. So we do have a murder, a suspect (who is possibly being framed) and an investigation, all typical pulp fare. However, the way that things unfold is anything but typical.

The detective, usually the focal point of pulp novels, is almost a minor character in SoHo Sins. Instead, our narrator, the art dealer, is the story’s focus. He’s the one who carries out most of the investigative legwork. And this detecting occurs at an almost leisurely pace, pausing for months while the art dealer deals art. It’s a lovely technique for freshening up a well-trodden path.

As the investigation meanders along, the detective focuses on a suspected child pornographer, and we meet a 12-year-old girl who is the daughter of a friend of the art dealer (try to keep up with me here). The girl, along with her mother, moves into the same building as the narrator and she starts referring to him as her boyfriend. This does not bother him, a man of some years, as much as it should. The detective asks him to investigate the pornographer (who is obviously interested in the 12-year-old), which requires him to pose as a fellow … pervert? Thus begins the descent into the slime.

Perhaps you can see why it’s bath time.

SoHo Sins will be published on July 19 and it will soon join the EPL collection of Hard Case Crime novels, along with the titles pictured below:

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Mr. Peabody’s Corner of Research and Revelation: Art

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In An Object of Beauty, author Steve Martin introduces readers to the rarified world of art dealers and art collectors. As a person who is more likely to collect fez-wearing chimps than fine art, I am not overly conversant with art galleries, auction houses or the quirks of rich collectors. Here we find Lacey, a young woman who will use any means to get what she wants, working in the lower echelons at Sotheby’s. As she rises through the ranks we learn about a variety of artists and styles as well as the behind-the-scenes operations of art auctions. Lacey is not a likeable character, but her careless attitude towards others is more self-centered than malicious. Eventually opening her own gallery, Lacey begins to focus on living artists, and thus Martin introduces the many unusual faces of contemporary art.

The story is narrated by an acquaintance of Lacey’s and he presents her adventures as a cautionary tale. We learn that morally questionable business practices can stall a career (when the perp is caught), that the art world is at the mercy of international economics, and that major events such as the 9/11 terrorist attacks impact business and economics.

Martin’s writing style is delicate and genteel and the narrator creates just the right degree of tension to make the reader wonder what’s going to happen next.

As a result of my narrow focus on fez/chimp related art, many questions arose as I read Martin’s novel. Here are a few of those questions along with some Everett Public Library holdings that might offer answers.

 1)      What goes on in the lives of art dealers?

2)      Martin paints art collectors as a rather idiosyncratic bunch. How much truth is there in this portrayal?

3)      Collectors might see something in a piece of art that I cannot see. How do I learn to better appreciate art?

4)      After primarily selling works of dead European artists, Lacey becomes interested in living American artists. What are some of the trends and techniques in American art and who are the artists who have been successful?

5)      “What is art?” is an all-encompassing philosophical quandary. A simpler version of this question is, “Why is modern art considered to be art?” Paint splatters, found objects and installations where the viewer is part of the artwork have become commonplace means of expression. How can one appreciate such unconventional works?

Gotta go, so much more to learn!

Ron