NON-FICTION FOR A NON-ENTITY

When he first mentioned the prospect of 'retirement' my first reaction was glee. 

Artists are notoriously competitive. Often in a mean-spirited way. Though we have been friends and colleagues for over 30 years, my good friend David Schoffman always makes me uneasy. I could never rid myself of the feeling of being judged. Schoffman makes me feel like a fraud. He makes me feel stupid.

By any conventional metric, his career must be seen as insignificant to the point of non-existent. When I compare my professional stature with his it's like comparing Michael Jordan with an overweight, 40-year old suburban dad playing horse in the driveway. And yet David makes me feel so dreadfully insecure.

So when Schoffman confided in me his plans to hang up his brushes for good I thought it would be a good opportunity to find out if there were others out there who also felt the sting of his silent rebukes. That is the genesis of 

I Finished Knowing.

I asked a selected group of Schoffman's closest friends to write a short encomium for publication. I was struck by the lack of enthusiasm that greeted my repeated requests. It took over two years to get 12 responses. Most were lukewarm. Some were overtly hostile.

I felt vindicated.

I urge all of my readers to buy the book because they include about 15 beautiful watercolors by me.

 

WILL HE BE MISSED?

Not a lot happens in the art world in the summer. I suppose that might be why my good friend David Schoffman waited till late June to announce his retirement.

It's hard to discern what exactly is his motive.

That he will no longer visit his studio every day is inconceivable.

He has no hobbies and enjoys no diversions.

Perhaps it's just a ploy to promote his new book.

Anyway, at least he continues to delude himself into thinking that people actually care.

 

PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS AN OLD MAN

For an old guy, my good friend David Schoffman is still in pretty good shape. In the summer months he never fully gets dressed and he typically returns from his stuffy studio with his tanned skin stained with paint. 

 

I'm not entirely sure what he's been working on these days. He rarely shows his work and when he does it's usually pictures that are decades old. I know he's busy but he remains annoyingly elusive when quizzed on the substance of his newer projects.

Occasionally he publishes a self-portrait - more as a practical joke than as a serious aesthetic gesture.

Still, I must hand it to him.

He's really in good shape.

SOMEONE SHOULD TELL HIM TO SHUT UP

Judging from the sheer variety of soapboxes he habitually ascends, my dear friend David Schoffman must be the cleanest artist in Los Angeles.

He seems to be everywhere articulating Delphic, epigrammatic and highly quotable pronouncements meant to assure his place in the pantheon of certified cranks.

Unlike his Dada progenitors however, Schoffman has the internet, which, depending on your point of view may be a tragedy or a coincidence.

THOU SHALT NOT

My good yet flawed friend David Schoffman has an image problem.

On the one hand he wants to present himself as a serious artist - one who is indispensable to "the discourse," but on the other hand he seems determined to sabotage his credibility by attaching his name to any number of dubious projects.

While most artists avoid smiling when photographed, David's slanted adolescent grin often comes off as a cynical grimace. His playful nature typically teases our contemporary taboos, insisting that somehow his Brooklyn provenance provides cover for his blunt insensitivity. 

I once heard him blurt out during an unscripted Q and A at one of California's most prestigious art schools that he had no problem with 'cultural appropriation!'

Everyone knows that C.A. is the third rail of artistic halal, but David went feet first into AfroPop's indebtedness to James Brown without the slightest tinge of self-consciousness.  (There was an audible gasp later on when he mentioned having a green bagel with a shmear of jalepeño cream cheese on St. Patrick's Day while sipping on a piping hot cup of Masala Chai).

David's many allies in the art world are growing weary of defending him. He refuses to go on an international apology tour claiming the outdated prerogatives of 'artistic freedom.'

Schoffman is definitely rolling the reputational dice.

I fear, however, that his luck may soon run out.

THE ENIGMA OF ARTISTIC ABSTINENCE

I've often wondered why my dear friend David Schoffman abandoned his thriving career as a visual artist in favor of becoming the principal archivist of the Bibliothèque nationale d'études culturelles en marge (BNECM).

As a painter, David enjoyed the kind of rare fame that appoints cultural vedettes with unparalleled prestige. A fixture in the world of ArtFairs, Museum galas, auction houses, galleries, casinos, penthouses, governmental offices, sheikhdoms and nearly every other cathedral of conspicuous wealth, David seemed to have had it all. Though his work was uneven his style was unmistakable and for nearly three decades Schoffman coasted the canals of consumption like a gilded gondola.

Then, one day in the early aughts, it was announced in a modest small-print ad in Le Monde that David Schoffman would assume the position of BNECM's archiviste en chef , taking the place of the legendary scholar of 16th century Burgundian tapestries and manuscripts, Jean-Chlomo Angoulème.   

Honestly, I can't picture David being happy so far away from the bright lights of art stardom but I guess the pressure simply wore him out.