Book 1 || Finding Prince Charming || Harry Styles

Chapter 31

Her view.

He walks over to the wall and turns the lights off. "Spooky," someone calls out when the room gets extremely dark right before the projector lights come on. An image of a painting was now on the front wall. "Does anyone know the name of this painting or its significance to our conversation?"
"The lady in the painting is a ho," a voice calls out.
"Why do you say that?" Harry responds back. "She's sitting there naked with two men."
"If there had been one man, would she still be a whore?"
"Yes. She's naked."
"So then we equate nakedness with whores?"
"She's naked in public."
"So a woman who's naked in public is a whore? How many people agree with that?" Several hands shoot up but I keep my arms at my side, not sure why we're talking about whores in an art history class. "I see. What if she had been naked inside a hotel room?" He looks around the room. "With one man. But she didn't know him. What would you think?"
"I'd want to know if she was hot and how much she costs." Niall calls out, and a gaggle of girls around him laugh.

I shake my head and roll my eyes, I'm not sure why Anna always seems to be interested in the worst guys. Not that I have a better track record. Shit, the last guy I've slept with is in the front of the class about to publicly out me for something that isn't even true.
"Would you pay?" Harry's tone grew serious. "What would that make you if you were paying for sex?"
"A man doesn't want to be bothered with a girlfriend but still wants to get laid," the kid retorts and Harry laughs.
"Touché." He sits on the desk, stretching his long legs out, and looks out at all of us students.

Everyone in the room is staring at him in amazement. He certainly knows how to draw attention to himself. The only two people who don't seem completely captivated by him are Louis and myself.
"Le Dejeuner sur l'herbe, originally titled Le Bain, is considered one of Manet's most shocking pieces of art or, I should say, it was considered a shocking piece of art when he exhibited it in 1863." He points towards the screen in the back. "Can you imagine living in the 1800's and seeing this? The shock value of a nude woman sitting casually and lunching with two men was too much for many at the time, and it was rejected by the Salon jury, a rejection that Manet used to his advantage."

I lean forward, mesmerized by Harry's voice and obvious intellect when it comes to art. When he speaks, the painting behind him seems to come alive. I feel my body humming with excitement. This is why I came to London--this feeling of really learning and being around others who love art as much as I do. Even if the professor is someone I never wanted to see again.
"'Ledejeuner sur l'herbe' means 'the luncheon on the grass,' so you can see that the title of the painting is quite literal."
"So she's not a ho?" the guy at the back of the class calls out again, and everyone, including Harry, laughs.
"But what is a whore?" Harry smiles. "Many believe the park depicted in the painting is the Bois de Boulogne, a large park in the western outskirts of gay Paris. A park that's well known for illicit sex and prostitution." His tongue darts out of his mouth again and he looks at me. "So what is to be believed? Is she a whore or isn't she?"
"Why do we think she's a whore" I shout out. "Why are we judging her when we don't even know her?"
"She's naked," someone cries out. "She wants to get some."
"Maybe she's just comfortable with her body, with her femininity. Why should she be ashamed of that? Even if she wanted to have sex with one or both of the guys, why would that make her a whore? Don't guys do that all the time? If it were a naked guy with two girls, no one would be calling him a gigolo." I huff out.
"Such a visceral reaction, Cassidy." Harry's expression changes to one of humour. "You talk as if you know the lady in the painting. You defend her as if she was family."
"Maybe Cassidy just wants to have a threesome," Justin calls out and laughs.

I stare at him with disgust. "I don't want to have a threesome, not that it's any of your business. But look at the painting carefully. Her pose isn't provocative. The men don't look aroused or in lust. They all look as if they are there just enjoying a picnic and she just happens to be naked. She is beautiful and unashamed."
Harry nods and then starts talking. "She is so unashamed that she stares at the viewer as if to say, 'And? And so what of my nakedness?' But for many, it wasn't just the subject matter that turned them off of the painting. It was also the technique that Manet used. A technique that differed from the customary Neoclassicist lines. A technique that other artist admired. And Manet became their leader and carried them through the Impressionist revolution."
"So Impressionism means that whores are no longer whores in paintings?" the boy at the back of the class calls out again, and I can feel myself growing annoyed with him.
"Impressionism means that not only did we see a shift in the art that was created, we also saw a shift in the way we saw the world. Art is not just something to breathe and learn from. It is our history and our future. It is our very essence captured and contained for the world and our ancestors to see." Harry's eyes close as his words flow easily like a fine wine down the throat.
"As you can tell, he's really into art," Louis whispers to me.
"Yeah, he seems to be really into art." I smile back at him, noticing now that they do have the same look in their eyes, though Louis' are open and happy while Harry's are closed off and full of distrust.

"Class, today I want you to think about what art means to you, what it has taught you. I want you all to present and talk about your favourite piece of art tomorrow. It doesn't have to be Impressionist. Tomorrow, I want us all to get to know each other." He smiles. "And now, you may go. This is the only day you'll get to leave early."