A FREQUENT GUEST AND ORGANIZER OF THESE GATHERINGS, Stefano weaves through the masses in polite gestures and false smiles. He entertains and indulges, even humors, until managing to earn his independence to better view the gallery. Sipping silently at the champagne he, himself, holds, Stefano’s attention fixates on the painting before him. Footsteps approach, and he hears them, but does not glance in their direction. Color him SURPRISED when they halt beside him, and bright blonde waves settling on slender shoulders and the RED of her dress… that earns her a glance.
“ Do not focus so much on what it is, and focus on the emotion behind it. Every piece feels, you just have to find it. ” Soft words from a man typically found in violence on off hours. Not that she’d know. Briefly, he turns to her, takes her in; all painted smile and bright, inquisitive eyes. He knows that LOOK somewhere, it reminds him of her… but the opposite. Blue and black, the colors of a bruise, the colors of a frozen pond. But this one? Red and yellow, colors of fire, of passion and attitude.
He can’t help but feel INSPIRED. Pity. At her words, he laughs. “ Why does it make you feel that way? ” He wonders what she sees, how differing their viewpoints were. How innocent was her imagination? Where he sees the beauty in FEAR, she sees sorrow. He wants to know why. — Transitioning the glass to his other hand and turning back to the painting, Stefano points without touching, trailing the DOMINANT splash of carmine. “ Look from the focus, and expand from there. Take in the colors separately and join them together. You will see more that way. ”
She’s a PHYSICAL sort of artist. A lover of DANCE and vibrant music, never any good at painting because she doesn’t like to sit STILL that long. “ Unfulfilled potential.” She answers offhandedly, though to her credit, she does as he says. She tries to imagine it from another view, from the focus, put the colors together in a new PERSPECTIVE. He has the voice and stature of a man who spends plenty of time in the company of paintings -- a quick glance over her shoulder reveals that her father is still nowhere to be seen.
“ the kind of thing when you know someone could have been BETTER -- I guess that’s the point of art, right ? To elevate beyond. I’ve heard some of the patrons say stuff like that before. “ She refocuses on the painting. Naturally, she LIKES the red, the splash so reminiscent of blood like a life ENDED. ( Was that going to be her, one day ? Cut short, her hand or someone elses, driven by RAGE and red red hate ? Herself, or someone else ? She doesn’t like the hot curl in her gut looking at this -- it reminds her of those dreams where she rips her fathers guts out, makes him as UGLY outside as he is within. )
“ --- and satisfaction. I feel that, too. “
Art is meant to move the soul -- she’s never been particularly MOVED by it before. There’s a tremble in her hands, so she brings them to rest clasped before her in a show of elegance and restraint. The budding show of crimson rage is beginning to boil. It wouldn’t do to lose her temper here, much less over a poor painting that hadn’t done anything to her.
SATISFACTION, she said -- and the frustration that comes with it still never being good enough.