Nia and the Duszą Wager

As the day began, we realized it was impossible to halt time as we desired. We decided to step a foot out into the real world, into the world that appeared less beautiful than the world we were creating at Grettisgata 99. I threw on a shirt I found under all the covers on the bed, a causality in our collision. Mismatched socks and Nia’s panties all littered the floor. The jeans with one leg inside out from when I slid them off her legs and tossed them aside laid in a heap. I usually hang up my coat, but that was also littered on the floor, along with my sweatshirt. It was like when we were finally alone, there was an explosion that sent our clothes flying in all directions, and the only things left standing in the blast were our bodies. I found socks resembling mine and slid on my shoes, setting out for Brauð & Co for pain au chocolat and coffee. Nia liked a little sweetness in her morning meals, while I elected a ham and cheese.

Upon my return, we ate the pastries and talked about the day. What we were going to do and what we weren’t. She didn’t work, and I was free; I was basking in that familiar feeling of freedom on one of my little excursions to faraway places. This time, however, I had company in a foreign land, a Polish princess to slide up and down the streets of Reyka with. I was to be tattooed the next day at noon at the Icelandic Tattoo Corporation, and she was to work at about that same time. Until then, however, our day and our lives were ours to do with as we pleased.

Sitting in her panties and one of my t-shirts, she told me about a museum she’d always wanted to visit but never had—the National Gallery with the bright green roof. The museum was across from the Tjörnin, the small lake in the city's center. A place where the ducks and geese come to the edges searching for food, and because there is no shortage of tourists, the fowl are all well-fed. We walked to the green-roofed building and paid for admission. Nia and I together walked through the exhibits showcasing Iceland's best works of artists past and present. A section of the Gallery houses the collection of one prominent collector. The story goes that the collector died and gave his collection to the Gallery to showcase. That was something that always captured me, considering Icelanders. The Island has intense pride; seeing people proud of their history and culture was nice. Coming from America, I’m told these are dreadful qualities, and perhaps that’s what makes American popular culture so obscene and insulting. The denial of that which is beautiful while uplifting all that is not.

Nia started, “I’ve always liked the classics over modernity. The old way is attractive to me. There is a more profound presence of something I can’t quite put my finger on; it’s apparent in older works. When I view them, I hear a voice screaming out, reaching into the void and burning even the smallest of flames for someone, anyone, to hear or see.”

I think that thing you find difficult to name is beauty. The computer images of today are not beautiful, that which can touch humanity in any meaningful way must come from the hands of a human. Culture hasn’t realized this yet, but it is the truth, an axiom of sorts.

Laughing and in a sarcastic tone, Nia asked, Not a fan of A.I.?

I write because when I do, I feel a shiver in the tips of my fingers as I convert thoughts into sentences, trying in absolute to present that which is beautiful and sure; maybe I fail sometimes, but a computer has no feeling. Every word I write is intended to be beautiful, a beautiful depiction of a life that has, in many ways, become a trap from which I cannot escape, for it is the words that help me to undo the snare. The computers have no understanding of this. They cannot fathom the result of a rotting heart and its subsequent break. They have not even the slightest understanding of what being a human means. They are completely in the dark, and yes, they can mimic, but they will fail because they have no spark or capacity to love. A computer cannot fool around in bed with another computer and feel the explosion of energy like you and I can. I have no fear of computers, for they are no threat to passion, no threat at all. Creating art and beauty is painful; to be an artist is to know pain like a panther knows to stalk or how a bird knows to fly naturally. Art should kill a man to create while giving his life meaning and providing the very reason to keep living.

We walked the museum some more, and I softened. Despite my tirades and sudden bursts of emotion, I'm not this tyrant of art. We walked the museum holding hands. Nia picked my brain some more, surrounding our discussion on art and beauty.

“The reason why art is difficult to define for most is because the definition is always changing. The standard, however, remains unchanged. The component most important is beauty. Is the thing beautiful? Meaning, medium, and subjects are all secondary to the primary intention of beauty. Lowest of all are factors like politics and popularity. The worst of all is the latter, as there is no such thing as collective beauty no more than there is a collective heart or collective breath. Nia, I think, I believe, that beauty exists, and sure, it is scarce sometimes, but it does exist in the efforts of individuals; it is in some corners, and when I see it, I know it. Beauty is objective as you are standing next to me.”

I think some might object to that.

Let them. They are not beautiful.

We are bound to pain, but we are not bound to beauty. The beautiful must be chosen intentionally, thus creating a demand for it, a call out to it. Otherwise, there is only pain in the absence.

“For instance, you are beautiful, Nia.”

Well, thank you.

I can see to your soul, the beauty is in you, and by way of a positive externality, your outside is beautiful, too. It’s one of the great gifts some men possess, the recognition, and I see it in you. Beauty is real, and it is objective.

I continued, Beauty should be at the forefront of everything a man makes. I don’t mean beauty in the sense of attractiveness or to the extent that a work is pleasant to consume. Beauty can be pleasing but also a horror, disgusting, and immoral; the most essential quality is the intention to present beauty. By giving a piece of yourself to the work and pouring yourself into it, an artist reveals something of himself that is true and devastating. Beauty does not hide from art, but pain does. The creation of art is a defiance of pain, a defiance of the trap of life. Beauty is the act, and art is the result. By putting yourself in a piece, you are giving something away to the audience and into the world more broadly. By extrication of a feeling, you are creating art from the transitory. The individual can feel and then express that transitory feeling to the audience and the world into something tangible. That’s beauty, Nia, at least one definition. The artist's responsibility is to turn a transitory feeling into something tangible outside of himself while still tethering to him, something crafted and then implanted. That’s beauty, that’s art, that’s the remedy to pain.

What does pain mean in this context? What does it mean to you?

Pain is feeling truly alone. Pain is hopelessness; hell is hopelessness; hell is the place you go when you would rather drift off into a long sleep hoping to return as someone else, anyone else, the desire to do over every day of your life with a new soul but you wake each day waiting for that familiar tidal wave of ruinous memory to return. A person loses trust in themself to be anything but half, fifty percent of everything they were or aim to be. Hell is hopeless regret. I’ve been to hell. I’ve seen it; it is dark and cold, and many souls know it, too. But from it comes beauty because those who have made it out know that you must give a piece of yourself away with every act of creation and expression. You must risk everything if it means getting out. You can only keep what you have if you give it away, and I try to give it away in everything. That’s beauty, Nia, that is the beautiful.

What is polish for soul?

Duszą

Art is a duszą’s wager. Everything to lose, everything to gain.

We stepped out of the museum after fulfilling our meandering urges, and I could tell Nia wanted to explore my contentions concerning art and beauty more. I suggested an early dinner; we walked to The Laundromat and collected ourselves in a booth, sipping espresso and eating finger sandwiches. I ordered a tall beer and Nia nestled herself into my side. I quite enjoyed the size of Nia; she was petite and fit. She could slip herself into the smallest of spaces. She told me about her early days as a ballerina, dancing in various studios all over Warsaw.

“I loved dance, and I guess I still do. It always felt like art to me. What were you saying about love? It never really goes away; it just settles on the margins?”

Yeah, something like that.

Well, ballet is on the margins; maybe it’ll creep over to the center someday?

I suppose it could, one day. I saw the ballet in The City, which was an extraordinary moment. One of the most profound of my life. The impetus for my thinking on beauty and art.

I’d let you watch me dance if you want. It’s been some years, but I think I still have it.

That would be wonderful, Nia.

We finished the espresso; I slammed the beer, stuffed the last finger sandwich in my mouth, and split. Walking up Austurstræti, crossing Lækjargata onto Bankastræti until finally reaching Laugavegur, we were heading back to my house where we would fuck on the black leather couch and sit tangled until we both caught our breath. Nia was so sexual; her short stature made her a bundle of concentrated nerves, and she reacted with every one of my touches. Night fell, and we spent the time kissing, chatting, drinking, and fucking. We stretched the wool blanket across us and sank into one another.

Nia asked, “Why do you wear this rosary if you aren’t religious?”

I’ve always loved iconography. Much of the architectural beauty we admire today was purposed for religious offerings to god. I think I wear the rosary because I’d like to believe I really would, but when I try, I feel like there’s this wall separating me from God. The wall separates me so, a separation so deep, I’m unsure if there is anything on the other side at all.

Are you religious?

No, I would say I try but in the back of my mind I know I do not believe. I go to the church to pray or at least try. Easter is coming, and I’ll go to the services, but I can’t believe it.

Then why attend?

In the hope that something will grab me. I want to believe I just do not.

Don’t you think spirituality better serves the individual than the group? For instance, why gather for a church service when you can recite the prayers and scriptures in your head alone? Is community as integral to spirituality as the religious seem to believe?

All I do is think, and when I travel, it’s not that the thinking stops or pauses but instead takes on a new form where I am far more open to others and their thoughts. I liked Nia’s naked body curving into mine, and I liked how easy it was to throw her body around like a stuffed animal, but what I cherished most was Nia’s ability to speak plainly. While we sat on the black leather couch, it was like we were openly exposing ourselves and baring ourselves to the other. It was beautiful, beautiful on purpose. There was beauty in the night and inside of us because we made it ours. We sculpted beauty from the slab of metaphysical marble, chipping pieces away until we made it a masterpiece. In the museum of our respective hearts, we erected a nearly identical statue and placed it in the entryway for all to see.

I walked Nia home in the early afternoon. It was late March. In Reyka, the sky was overcast, but that affected me little; I was comfortable walking the one-way streets, smoking a cigarette, and occasionally throwing my arm around her. It felt like the city wasn’t all that foreign, it felt like I had been in Reyka for years. We went through a park almost entirely gray save the small flowers beginning to bloom on the ends of branches. I kissed Nia goodbye at her doorstep, and we held a stare until she closed the door behind her.

La Carta - Marie-Augustin Zwiller