Our reaction to Dr. Ellison’s theory varied. Some of us were glad at our one shot at fame and parlayed into little victories like my cookbook. Others drank themselves to death like Belinda, who could face the fact she had no talent. Of course the best known case—the one you’ve been reading this interview to see if I would mention—see I still have a few mystery writer tricks even if I am eighteenth-rate—was Dr. Ellison. One of the good dentist’s clients was Vernon Ghosh, a well-know writer of techno-thrillers. Ellison gassed him when he was in for his yearly dental visit and then cut up his body with an eye to making lasagna from it. The unfortunate visit of a young mad with a chipped tooth exposed Ellison’s attempt at cannibalism.
Ironically it lead to new interest in our work and a re-release of WINT, which has remained in print since. We all denied any understanding of his actions, and if in our black hearts we had been thinking of a similar deed, we abandoned such evils schemes.
Although not quite the youngest of our little group of wannabes I am the last to draw breath, and I will not do so for much longer. I enjoyed sharing our story for Has-Beens on Parade.
DIARY FOUND IN AN ABANDONED STUDIO
I couldn’t paint when I took the medicine.
If I laid off for a few days the images would come and I could finish a canvas, but there was always the danger that I would forget who was doing the painting, or maybe even right and wrong. So I started this diary. I’ll read it every day and write in it every day and that way I won’t get in trouble like that other time. Yesterday I prepared a canvas. Today I put my medicine aside. Tomorrow I’ll start my sketches.
Day 2. My name is Tyrone Watson. I am thirty-eight. I live in Austin, Texas. There that seems pretty sane. I don’t think it’s a good idea to kill one’s critics. Violence has no special beauty. If I want to get people, I’ll just caricature them. I work for Roberta Sais.
I started today on The Market of Values, which will be a study in blues and grays of people at some sort of carnival buying and selling things of no value. Maybe I’ll work in miniatures of Bessie Vollman’s paintings.
Day 3. Ideas are getting really slippery today. It feels great. My sketchbook is filling up and Markets coming along. Oh I forgot to do my focusing mantra.
My name is Tyrone Watson, MFA. I have had two one-man exhibitions. The last was five years ago.
There that’s in control. In fact the only control problem I have is wanting to spend all my time up here painting instead of down in the shop, but that’s normal. Artists want to do art. It’s a pity that business hours coincide with the light being good.
Day 4. Depressed today.
Day 5. Depressed today. Did nothing. Got mad.
Day 6. My name is Tyrone Watson. I am thirty-eight. I live in Austin. I had a great day. A Mr. Simon Pound had a lot to ask me about my art. Maybe I’m in for a comeback. I started to take him upstairs and show him my work in progress, but a little voice told me not to. I don’t mean a little voice like before, I just mean a hunch, that feeling of not letting people in on it until you’re ready. I got a lot done today. Market should be finished tomorrow.
Day 7. Finished Market. Not as good as I had hoped, but still that’s the essence of the artistic personality. Always dissatisfied. Like Faust. I’m starting something more free form, a response to those people who caused me so much trouble. I’m going to call it Exposed Heart. I’m not sure how to start. Well an idea suggests itself, but not a good one. My name is Tyrone Watson. I’m thirty something a painter on the go.
Day 8. Busy.
Day 9. Spent several hours with my model.
Day 10. Mr. Pound came by today. I was disappointed to learn he wasn’t an art critic. He is a retired cop. His life story seemed pretty interesting. Maybe I’ll do him after Exposed Heart which is coming along nicely thank you. It’s a little bit more gory than anything I’ve done in years.
Day 11. My name is Tyrone Watson. Today Mr. Pound came by and we discussed our life stories, which were amazingly similar. I want to get to know him because I’m going to do a picture of him called The Multidimensional Blue Lines .
He became a cop in the ’70s. His big ambition from the first was to make detective. He studied every text on criminology, took every possible course and dedicated his ife to that particular transformation, but various political forces downtown saw to it that he didn’t make the grade.
I told him how critics had ruined my two shows, particularly the second show when Bessie Vollman’s competing exhibition won such lavish praise. She had been the more “politically correct” artist. So her career took off and I managed a used bookstore for minimum wage and free studio space.
He asked if he could see my work in progress, and I told him no. I hate anyone to see something before I’m done with it. But I told him that I was interested in painting him. At first he seemed surprised, then readily agreed.
He asked me if I knew anything about the death of two art critics five years ago.
I asked him if he was still a cop.
He said that he quit the force a couple of years ago. He’d arrested too many criminals who got off on technicalities. So he quit. He was near enough retirement anyway and he had a few investments that had paid off well. He liked to keep his hand in. The police, he assured me, at least the good cops—the real force—still called him for advice.
I asked him how long he’d been interested in art. He said that every good cop is interested in art. The artistic mind and the criminal mind are very, very similar. Most criminals, he reasoned, were failed artists.
But criminals don’t have critics, I told him.
“Of course they do,” he said. “Cops, they catch inept criminals. The great criminals go free.”
I had never thought of a cop as a critic for a criminal’s art.
Day 12. Terrible dreams last night. I was too depressed to open the store.
Day 13. It’s been almost two weeks and I’m doing fine. Maybe I’m over my trouble. My name is Tyrone Watson. Elementary, my dear Watson. Someone broke into the shop last night, they didn’t take anything but I think they may have been through my studio. Both the outside door and the studio door were open. Despite this I can’t tell you how GREAT I feel. I started two different paintings this morning. I started to call the owner and tell her the shop had been broken into, but realized that would screw up my process. I painted like Picasso. I’ll stay here at night. Maybe I’ll catch my burglar and paint him. I’m ready. I’m ready for anything. I feel GREAT!
Day 14. I painted well into the night and finished my first painting; a riotous and much spangled study in purple and green called The Water People Are Talking to Me. I went out for a walk about 3:00 AM. I needed inspiration for the second piece—a study in chrome yellow called Voltman Discharges. Oh what a wonderful great buzzy great picture! Zip zzp, I say, zip zap.
Day 15. Mr. Pound came by with the news about Bessie Vollman. I felt really, really bad for a moment as though it had something to do with me. I suppose that shows I have a great soul that I can feel sorry for a rival. I asked to see the obituary notice since he was carrying the paper. Sure enough although I was Bessie’s greatest rival I wasn’t mentioned. Maybe I should send a wreath or something, after all I would be remembered a hundred years hence and she will be forgotten. Maybe I should go to the funeral to do a second painting of her.
Mr. Pound told me that he was unable to find any references to my one-man show five years ago. He said he was hoping to see some photos of my previous work. He seemed genuinely sad when I told him that it had all been purchased by Japanese investors.