An introduction to Goodfellow

For a while now, I have been writing stories about a character named Goodfellow.  Eventually, I hope to compile these into a novel.  For now, I am content to play with his character.  He is a pleasant, peaceful, lucky man with a good heart.  I hope you come to  like him as much as I do.  

So, now, here's the first installment, at least the first published here, and a link to the painting discussed:

http://www.cegur.com/Hockney/BeverlyHillsHousewife.html

Sinful Pleasure

Goodfellow sat quietly in front of his computer, looking through his music library.  For some time, he had been storing a lot of photos of paintings in iTunes.  He knew that the folks at Apple had intended the photo storing capability of this music database to be used to store album artwork, but like so many other tools, he utilized this one in his own way.  So, along with his eclectic collection of music, he stored paintings by Hockney, Bosch, Basquiat, Warhol, O'keefe, Bacon, Pollock, and many others.   Anyway, as Goodfellow browsed his collection, he finally settled down to gaze on a David Hockney painting titled "Beverly Hills Housewife." It was a representation of a classic late mid-century modern, Californian house with a wall of glass, but missing the manditory, ubiquitous, and luxurious in-ground pool.  It reminded him of the Philip Johnson Glass House - austere and beautiful.  Prominently displayed inside the home was a bauhaus zebra-hide lounger, it's purpose to provide both comfort and aesthetic pleasure. Behind it, hanging on the wall, was a stuffed head of an antelope killed on safari.  The atmosphere was one of  tropical, jungle-like, but controlled savagery. Watching over the scene, a verdant stone sat like a minimalist moai totem.   

Far in the foreground the lawn was clipped, exact, perfect, sanitized, artificial looking.  Slightly off-center stood a woman in a kaftan-like pink dress.  She stood posed in a three quarter view, contra-jour - the window behind her pulsating with jungle plants shaped like claws or ululating tongues.   Although she was a platinum blonde, the woman's face was painted to be gaugainesque, indian-like with high cheek bones, large lips,  a prominent nose, and exotic eyes. Goodfellow almost expected to see, on closer view, an epicanthic fold in the eye. 

He thought to himself that Hockney had given all the clues.  In fact, Goodfellow wondered how they could have been missed.  This was a portrait of a trophy wife - someone who does not really belong in her current, sterile environment.  In some sad way, she had been modified to fit her quarters.  She had been stuffed like the animal head or skinned like the zebra.  Life was on the outside, beyond the glass windows that shone with streaked patterned light like the diagonal bars of a luminous cage.  

Goodfellow sat back, surprised and delighted.  Kind though he was, he could appreciate the artist's acerbic wit.  He wondered whether the patron ever got the joke.  Like Whistler's Peacock Room - a biting condemnation of his gold-eating patron, this work seemed to Goodfellow like a melancholy critique either divinely inspired or long planned for with the hard worked-out precision of l'esprit de l'escalier.  Or maybe Hockney had caught on to the joke of a clever decorator and pushed it further?  What did it matter?  The work spoke on its own.

Amused, Goodfellow started the corresponding song, Lou Reed's "Perfect Day."  It occurred to him that he had made a good choice coupling these two works.  He looked at the housewife's perfect world, sterile, manicured, and artificial, and compared it to Lou Reed's heroine induced madness.  The juxtaposition seemed inspired but perhaps too close to home.  Goodfellow wondered what Hockney would make of him - Goodfellow?  What incisive cuts would the artist make? What bone, muscle and sinew would he expose? As he contemplated his own life, sheltered too, quiet, comfortable, Goodfellow wondered: Was he as caged?  What bound him? What and where were his chains?  How far from nature had he strayed or been led?

Lou Reed's song was beautiful.  Once again it had grabbed his attention.  Goodfellow wished he could gulp it down like a cool drink in one fast gesture. He was greedy for its substance.  Then Goodfellow's phone rang.  Without rushing he rose and lowered the song's volume.  Then he walked slowly to the kitchen and began washing dishes.  The answering machine clicked on, but he didn't pick-up the phone or even try to monitor the call. Instead he stared out the window and marveled at the morning sky...