An Approach to Black by Emily Jeremiah

Author:Emily Jeremiah
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Reflex Press
Published: 2021-08-03T00:00:00+00:00

We are all shadows, but traces will remain – echoes, shadows, reverberations.

The paintings have been hung perfectly. That’s what they all agree: Emma and Maria, Jonathan and Georg. They are beautifully lit in a white-painted room with high windows that reveal birch-branches and summer sky. The space is thronged by visitors holding glasses and talking, and pointing, and glancing at the information sheets, and filled with their hubbub.

Emma walks slowly, occasionally pausing to catch her breath. Jonathan is concerned, but she doesn’t meet his eye. Occasionally she leans into Maria, for support.

Jonathan looks over at Georg, who in turn is looking up at a painting of bright red berries: crimson spheres contrasting with the white snow coating the branches of the bush. He feels like crying and at the same time he’s struck by how remarkable this whole event is; this discovery of his great-great-great-grandmother’s paintings and now this event. And journalists taking photos and notes. The exhibition has already featured in magazines and on the radio. And it’s thanks to Emma, and her investigations, and her book. He looks at her again and smiles. She smiles back, the pain seeming to lift from her face momentarily.

Emma feels giddy. The paintings seem to suck her in, knock her off her feet. They are so vivid. She feels, looking at the prow of the boat and the water, that she is there, lying in the vessel, feeling spray on her face. But then there is the reassuring strength of Maria’s arm. And then there is the nagging pain that lifts only for moments at a time. She can see that Jonathan has registered it, but no matter.

There’s that young lad, the student. She lifts her arm, and he comes over, grinning. ‘How is your thesis coming along?’

‘I’ve finished it. And I’ve got a job.’

‘Oh?’

‘In an archive, just temporary.’ He starts telling her about it, and she feels herself smiling and smiling but at the same time receding, and still dimly but gladly aware of Maria’s arm. Now Maria and the boy are talking, and Maria is saying all the right things. And Emma feels a wave of sentimental joy: that young men become archivists, that all this – she looks around vaguely – all this – art, culture, enterprise – will carry on.

She finds herself face to face with an old man in his wheelchair. His eyes look damp, and he reaches out his gnarled hand. ‘My grandfather would like to thank you,’ says a young woman who introduces herself as Pia.

‘Oh really,’ Emma says. ‘It was nothing. I’m only too glad...’ She falters, and she feels the pain rise within her. Maria leads her away, leaving the young archivist to talk to the old man. She’s sitting on a chair now, in the corner, and Maria is bringing her a glass of water.

The old man dabs at his eyes with a handkerchief. Everything seems like a dream: this bright room, all these people, and the paintings, the paintings. They are so beautiful.

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