The Thirty Something Snap

Chapter Three - The Male Model

Penny had downloaded the files from our boss, Richard, that would give us an overview of artist Tomoko Takahashi. She opened her laptop on the kitchen table and I slid my chair over to her side of the table so that we could review the files together.

The text revealed that Ms. Takahashi was forty seven years old, born in Tokyo where she studied at Tama University. She also studied in London at the Slade School of Fine Art and Goldsmiths college.

“I should have studied art,” I said to Penny.

Penny turned and looked at me over the rim of her reading glasses and said, “You did study art. You just did it on your own.”

This was true. I was always a do-it-yourself kind of guy when it came to most of the things I have managed to become somewhat proficient at. “Yeah,” I replied, “But maybe if I had enrolled in a prestigious school to study art, or music, or anything like that, then I would be the one whose files you’d be studying to create a PR campaign for.”

Penny kept her eyes on the screen of her laptop as she scrolled through the images of Tomoko Takahashi’s work. She then said, “If I was looking at your work then who would be sitting next to me right now?”

“This is one of those parallel universe conversations, isn’t it?” I joked. Then I answered Penny’s question, “Maybe Peter?”

“Your nudist friend?”

I laughed. “He’s not really a nudist,” I said, “he’s just going through a phase.”

“I know, you told me,” Penny replied, “The thirty-something snap.”

“Right,” I said.

Penny opened an image file that displayed on her screen. It was a piece by Ms. Takahashi called “Auditorium Piece” and was dated 2002. It looked like a cluttered attic. The text with the image labelled the artwork as “Mixed Media” and indicated that the installation art was on display at the UCLA Hammer Museum.

“This is why I wouldn’t have been a good art student,” I commented to Penny.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“Well, I don’t get this stuff,” I said. “I mean, to me this looks like it could be someone’s unorganized attic. I’d be in my art class painting pictures of people or cows or something and the other artists would turn their noses up at it.”

Penny laughed. “Maybe,” she said, “But we certainly can’t use THAT sentiment to create our PR campaign.”

Penny turned her head abruptly to look at me.

“What?” I asked. I had a feeling that she just had a brainstorm.

“Your sentiment,” Penny said. “That IS what we should use as a premise of this campaign. You speak for a lot of New Yorkers that would never go to any art show, especially one like this. That is why the sentiment you just expressed is EXACTLY the angle that we should approach this from. An angle that speaks to the average New Yorker and not just the artsy crowd.”

I got it. “I think you’re on to something, Penny,” I said.

Penny then opened the file that showed a photograph of Tomoko Takahashi. Penny and I looked at the photo and then moved on to a short video that Richard had sent a link to from YouTube.

“You know what I’m thinking,” I said rhetorically to Penny, “I’m thinking she is a modern Yoko Ono. Before Yoko met John Lennon and began working in his world of music, she was an artist who challenged people’s preconceived notions about what constitutes art. I think Tomoko is doing the same thing.”