The priority of my little artist stipend was the tube pass and a phone, which is why I ate only pasta at home—electricity could not fit into my stipend, and it was the last on the list of priorities. Those Notting Hill houses had this electricity top-up system—you topped electricity up like a phone. I had let mine run out. In fact, I would plug in my electricity in the hallway, in the socket meant for hoovering the staircase.
And it was at this time of humble living, in between the realms of India Jane’s shop, glamorous art events, brunches and dinners Marina and Tarrek’s place, and very little time in my own dark place, that I suddenly had an idea.
I believe we "land ideas" or "channel ideas"—ideas just come to you. And all you need to do is realize them or not—and if you don’t do it, they fly away, and somehow it’s never the right time for it ever again. Usually the idea requires courage , and jumping and risking and investing energy and money, but if you do it- it rewards you. Sometime its too scary to jump though.
The incredible, genius idea—that landed to the very broke Sunci, without a pound in her pocket until the end-of-month paycheck— was almost biblical.
My concept was to paint portraits of artists and art scene people over dinner that I would make and invite them to.
Though Marina pointed out how slim and beautiful I looked, I felt always hungry that summer. So, to make dinner and paint others at dessert was my plan.
And the people who wanted to have this experience with me but were not in any way involved with art—they would pay for the experience and keep their portrait, and in this way, they would fund the project and the growing collection of the art scene people’s portraits -that I planned to exhibit some day.
It sounds complicated—but it was brilliant.
I suddenly had a project to offer to whomever I felt like. To people we met at the fancy art parties, I offered to be my muses for the project—be it art journalists, artists, architects, gallerists. To people who had money and loved art, I offered to be patrons for the project—London bankers.
I had become a member of the then-private social group, Small World. To enter this community, you had to be invited. It was a kind of Facebook, limited to jet-setters & socialites. It still exists. Maybe there was something about being in a house with no electricity that sped up my genius or made the angels feel sorry for me and send me the concept.
For while in Rome in the previous two years, I had sustained myself from art and got used to the fact that I could. In London, I was brand new in terms of collectors. No one knew me. I had to get myself on the map quickly so that I could live for my work. And this project did just that.
The main sources for the muses I painted were face-to-face encounters at the art events and Small World. Very quickly, the word got out about my project among the London City bankers. Many wanted to have this experience. They had a bet on who would succeed in seducing me—none of them did.
I was right in the middle of a completely bodyless, romantic email correspondence with an artist in Berlin that kept me infatuated and freed my body and time to work and dedicate myself fully to being a born-again Londoner.
Very soon, "Dinner with Sunci" took off. I was painting sometimes two people a day. I had money to move house and moved to the Barbican with three fun flatmates, where "Dinner with Sunci" blossomed and was cooked for many nights, feeding everyone in the flat. The dinners became social events at times.
Soon, people on the London art scene knew me—I was painting so many of them—and the art collectors knew me—enough to make it possible to leave the shop job before the month was up.
I was being invited to Ibiza, Paris, and Istanbul, and I no longer cared about India Jane—for I had money and was back to being independent with ART.
The space in Portman Square I had wanted to book—and trusted in magic that somehow I would—was paid for by a London gallerist who just wanted to help me out and sponsor the project after I painted her over lunch.
No comments:
Post a Comment