"Different. Not better."
"No. Better. You're not just documenting anymore. You're interpreting."
I suppose he’s right, the work has evolved. The first portfolio was raw observation, but this is something deeper. More personal.
More dangerous.
Week 4 - Dom
The scanner crackles at 4:17am.
"Units respond to 3000 block of Thomas Avenue. Possible 187. Victim found in alley behind commercial building."
I'm already moving, pulling on my jeans and a hoodie. Roxy's awake instantly, her eyes bright with that familiar hunger.
"How far away?" she asks.
"Fifteen minutes."
We're in the car in three. Thomas Avenue at dawn is all shadows and graffiti and chain-link fences. The kind of neighborhood where violence is a background noise, where people learn not to see things.
We park two blocks away and approach on foot. Police are already there with two units, lights flashing. Crime scene tape going up. Roxy has her camera hidden in her jacket, the small digital one that doesn't draw attention. She positions herself near a bus stop, just another early morning commuter waiting for a ride.
The body's behind the building, out of sight. But I can see the coroner's van arriving, the detectives conferring near the tape. Roxy takes three photos, before walking back to me like nothing has happened.
"Good?" I ask.
"Great. The light was just right with that blue pre-dawn glow."
“Let’s get out of here.”
We drive to a diner in Ten Park and she sketches while we wait for breakfast. Not the crime scene because that comes later, from memory. Right now she's drawing the waitress, a woman in her fifties with tired eyes and a mechanical smile.
"She's been doing this for thirty years," Roxy murmurs, her pencil moving. "You can see it in her posture. The way she doesn't really see the customers anymore."
"Sad?"
"Resigned. Which is sadder."
The sketch takes twenty minutes, and when she's done, the waitress is rendered in brutal honesty with every line of exhaustion, every hint of dreams abandoned.
"You're going to include this one?" I ask.
"Maybe. If I can get five or six more like it to make a series about invisible people."
"You're invisible."
She looks up, her eyes meeting mine. "Exactly. That's why I see them."
The email from Petra arrives on Wednesday.
RB,
Gallery promotion is going well. We have significant collector interest already. I'm proposing we price the Berlin pieces higher than New York, I’m thinking €6,000 to €12,000 depending on size and medium. The European market responds well to the mystery. Several collectors have specifically mentioned wanting to "own a piece of the invisible artist."
Thoughts?
Petra
