Publisher: Bywater Books
What
should be said about a book that is supposed to be a satire on pretentiousness
and becomes pretentious itself? Either
it’s a great success or a colossal failure.
First,
it must be pointed out that this is a work of fiction. Sloin does such an excellent job of creating
the sense that this is a biography that readers and others are constantly
confused as to what it is. The book succeeded at winning an award for
nonfiction until it was pointed out that the story is pure fiction.
Francesca
deSilva is the product of a dysfunctional family. Her mother dotes on Francesca’s older sister
Isabella who is supposed to be a genius and her father is at a complete loss as
to what to do with this family.
Francesca retreats to a bedroom in the attic where she lives a solitary
existence, only occasionally intruded upon by family obligations. She falls in love with Chinese chess champion
Lisa Sinsong, a product herself of a skewed family life and when they are
discovered in bed together, Francesca flees.
She begins a bohemian existence drifting until she comes to live in a
barely rustic cabin in the woods.
Francesca turns to painting to express her perspective on things and
finds herself acclaimed as the creator of a new style. Ten years later she returns home to visit her
family for the first time and takes all of her artwork with her. A fire kills her and destroys most of her
work, returning her life to the tragedy that had always shadowed it.
This
is not a book for someone who wants a leisurely entertaining reading
experience. It takes effort to get
through this book. The story can’t be
consumed by itself because the reader is distracted by the footnotes and
commentary that are sprinkled through it.
Even while you tell yourself that these items are manufactured by Sloin,
they seem realistic and beg to be read.
Often the real points of the book are expressed in these notes and not
in the story. Francesca’s story is
second place to the observations that are made in the notes. Sometimes that’s a blessing because Francesca
is the type of character a reader wants to shake and tell to wake up to real
life. Then again her whole family is
composed that way. In the end Francesca
deSilva is a pathetic character. What
makes her life noteworthy is her paintings and they don’t survive her, so there
is a feeling of a waste of a life and a waste of effort to tell about that
life.
Sloin
uses the book to make some strong statements.
In the footnotes she takes jabs at the art community as she manufactures
experts to give manufactured opinions.
It becomes clear that she has little respect for “experts.” She also attacks segments of the gay and
lesbian community. There is a protracted
discussion of dykes (are you or aren’t you?) and a dismissal of the lesbian
mafia that is too concerned with determining if something is lesbian enough or
not. Then there is a passing swipe at
the transgender community. It almost
seems that Sloin wanted to write a commentary about the gay/lesbian and art
communities, but thought that would be ignored, so she decided that the way to
get attention was to write them into a story.
The result of that is a disjointed reading experience as the reader is
tossed from the story to the footnotes and back again.
Art on Fire has drawn
attention and won some awards. Other
reviews range all over trying to decide if its mastery is as a quasi-biography
(although fictional), a satire on the artistic community or a complex,
intricate novel. Sometimes a book, play
or movie is written that people can’t really comprehend, but the feeling is
that it’s because you’re just not smart enough.
If you just had a little more insight, you would see the “beauty” of the
work yourself. If that isn’t the epitome
of pretentiousness, what is? Sometimes
the emperor really isn’t wearing any clothes.
