Mart Gayford creat a portra of an anarchic pater wh views on everythg om Leonardo's failgs to Prcs Margaret's voice , wr <strong>Lra Cummg</strong>
Contents:
- MAN WH A BLUE SRF: ON STG FOR A PORTRA BY LUCIAN FRD, BY MART GAYFORD
- MAN WH A BLUE SRF: ON STG FOR A PORTRA BY LUCIAN FRD BY MART GAYFORD
MAN WH A BLUE SRF: ON STG FOR A PORTRA BY LUCIAN FRD, BY MART GAYFORD
* martin gayford man with a blue scarf *
There is a ic scene, about halfway through art cric Mart Gayford's patient acunt of stg for Lucian Frd for seven punishg months, when the two men are speedg down Bayswater Road a taxi. Frd sudnly asks Gayford where he n buy bathroom sl, anx that he may have gaed a pound or two weight.
Gayford is taken aback, until the artist explas that every ounce unts when you spend 10 hours a day on your feet dartg back and forth before the nvas. It mt ed take stama, Gayford reflects, to be a tly great pater like Frd.
And no matter how fascatg s revelatns of the artist's workg life and his pungent views on patg, what rri the narrative is this dialogue between the two, which Frd is vividly surprisg, potent and dynamic, while Gayford is steadily attentive and rpectful, ocsnally worryg about his appearance a mock‑Pooterish Frd famoly guards his privacy, avoidg the prs, visg mms by night and givg only two TV terviews, to my knowledge, the last quarter-century.
MAN WH A BLUE SRF: ON STG FOR A PORTRA BY LUCIAN FRD BY MART GAYFORD
And though he has talked to other art crics over the years, notably Robert Hugh and William Feaver, Gayford is the first to rerd the daily rual of stg. Gayford is a reful scribe, notg everythg said wh plsible tegry (even though, prumably, no tape rerr was ed, sce he only cid to wre the book after the patg was fished).
A va man would never have nfsed to everythg that Gayford regards as vany: his disappotment when another portras gets last-mute attentn for a show; his anxiety about whether his ear hair, "protdg the manner of the late Leonid Brezhnev" will be noticed and rerd for ever. It be a game of grandmother's tensn ratchets as Gayford yearns for the stgs to e to an end and Frd grows jumpier at the prospect. "After six months, Gayford brightens wh hope.
Gayford's wife also regnis a characteristic darkns of mood the portra that he do not. Gayford feels is "me lookg at him lookg at me", which is only the tth of most eye-to-eye portras. To s for Frd is to receive a phenomenal act of Gayford is a wily rpected art cric, equable and good-lookg wh a penchant for srv.