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STUDIO - ART - ANTONIO PESSOA
THE 80īs 
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- ambivalent crossroads -
Peter van Dijk is becoming sadly aware that his series of actions advancing Antonio Pessoa's career toward a position of stability and reputation is turning out to be a frustrating campaign.
On the other hand Antonio Pessoa feels to a moderately sufficient extent satisfied with his multiplex talent which is withholding the ultimate commitment of binding himself to a single course of action,in this particular instance,fine arts.
No big deal,now that we look back at the past from the present times comfortable standpoint.However it was indeed going to take ten years before Antonio Pessoa gives up everythig else in order to fully commit himself entirely to a professional only fine arts assured mature attitude and performance.
However it was definitely an awesome life perspective back then for an artist in the fascinating process of discovering the world,sexuality,art and himself.
On the other hand Peter was growing more and more standoffish just by helplessly watching his marketing researches and time investments turn out to be a no way out alleyway,being money not at all his main priority or basic motivation,for fact is it was genuine his emotional involvement in Antonio Pessoa's artwork and furthermore specifically personal, in his upraised vital energy which inevitably was indeed the generator of such an amazing compulsive creative production capacity.
As a matter of fact this very same inherent working potential energy,ten years later is one of the main qualities which markedly is going to pinpoint his ever growing reputation as a mass production high quality sort of artist.
Anyway,anyhow,back to those days , the tense atmosphere between the two friends wasn't actually giving signs of getting any better,to say the least.If Peter was stubborn enough about his concept of how the artist's career should be managed and handled,Antonio Pessoa was tenaciously unwilling to exchange freedom and real time spontaneousness enjoying the moment without constraint, for a methodical orderliness based working discipline.
And as there's always an end for everything in life,well,well,well,
that sure actually did it.
Jacob Kotsky 
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- on the road again -
That cold winter Antonio Pessoa once again gets a band together with three dutch musicians.The Horny Angel.Besides this band he plays everywhere in Holland with his english friend Martin Camp,just for the fun and obviously some little extra income couldn't do them no harm.From Amsterdam they drove with their instruments on the backseat to places like Delft,Hilversum,Tilburg,Arnhem,Den Haag,Haarlem,Alkmaar,Assen,Leeuwarden...and Groningen.
By then,Antonio Pessoa was still far from knowing that Groningen was going to live and have a very special place in his memory forever after.
Still living at Peter's place,Antonio had no longer any spare time for Art.And Peter van Dijk was running out of patience despite his good-natured tolerance and his profound admiration toward the artist.
Antonio Pessoa meets Mona at Martin's place.Mona is Dutch,she's cheerful,sexy and bright and they stick together for a couple of weeks.Nothing serious thou,just easy going love and good-time rock n' roll.The young ones celebrating life.
The artist introduces Mona to Peter and,surprise,surprise,it's hate at first sight.The situation was getting rather complex,apparently civilized,but just on the surface for inherently about to get out of control.
That Monday everyone decides to take the whole week off.Martin splits to Manchester,U.K.,Mona goes to Rotterdam to be with her family and Antonio Pessoa takes off bound for Paris once again.Peter van Dijk stays in Amsterdam.
One week later Antonio steps off the train at the Amsterdam's Central Station and takes a sit at the charming restaurant upstairs for a getting high-take your time continental breakfast.
One hour goes by and the artist pacifistically goes-as-he-pleases through the drawings and sketches he had done that relaxing week in Montmartre.
A blond young woman about his age sitting at the front table smile on her beautiful face gives him the signal to join him.And join him she did.She is crazy about Art,she declares,back home from London,the dutch girl tells him she's on her way to her hometown.Groningen.
Two in the afternoon,she already has his adress,three in the afternoon they both feel this special something,this unspoken desire to see eachother again.
They kiss goodbye,Antonio Pessoa far from knowing that his whole life was just about to turn upside down.
Jacob Kotsky 
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- the fine arts swindle -
Peter van Dijk these days was watching Antonio Pessoa coming in and going out obviously enthusiastic about everything but Fine Arts.
His dutch friend besides not being at all able to understand,let alone digest his behaviour, definitely wasn't accepting the arrogant indolance of someone so talented for arts and yet so immaturely driven by primitive-primary spontaneous impulsions and childish ephemeral infatuations.
A few times he actually tryed to talk him back down to reason going to considerable trouble by ensure him observance of rules,mainly just with the particular purpose to make the artist admit once and for all he was indeed about to cross the line of the reasonable and about to jump over the edge.
There were twenty oils on canvas hanging on the walls,like ghost spectrums of the past,dusty,silent and sullen,menacing visions brooding over his head all day long.
Antonio Pessoa's supernatural powers were by now a dead legend,no more oil colorful charming incantations by the hands of a talented early rising hard working artist,the magical spell was broken and the illusory feats were now seen as an obnoxious swindle illustration.
Face-saving was definitely out of question,now that the compromise was adulterated,going on keeping maintaining dignity or prestige would be a useless and pointless fake.
The valuable ingredients of their relationship were being corrupted by the city itself.The lively Amsterdam's night life and its impure substances were taking his artist away from the productive dimension where he indeed did belong.
Antonio Pessoa's recklessness was leading him along a very winding road and all Peter could possibly do right now was sit quietly and call up memories of the artist's golden days.
His way of thinking was no longer reconcilable with the talented young man's perfunctory performance now.
The recapitulation of the past was rather painful while the blind rebel one wasn't giving any signs of willing to even consider the lost at stake.
It was a sad situation getting more and more absurd and it looked as if there was no way they could talk it over anymore.
Those were the last days of Peter and Antonio Pessoa together,as Art lovers,as partners,as friends.
Jacob Kotsky 
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- lightning and thunder -
Antonio Pessoa in his very early twenties is an outstanding guitar player,he sits at the piano for three hours in a row in a solo concert while people cheerfully gather around and he is indeed an amazing singer as well.
That's why the "dilemma" is going to persist remaining for one decade yet before he finally stakes on the outcome of fine arts.
He loves Amsterdam,he loves his freedom and he is enjoying being cheerful,loved and alive taking things as they come and celebrating life all the time.
He believes he's living the time of his life with God by his side,the world at his feet and with the universe as his guide.
He acquaints with Frank Zappa at the Rotterdam Ahoy.
Antonio Pessoa invites him to rehearse at his father's farm in southern Portugal and the american musician invites him to L.A.
Nevertheless they are not going to stumble eachother ever again because life is just about to pay Antonio Pessoa one of those tricks one is never supposed to forget.
Surprise,surprise,Peter that evening can't hold it back any longer and surprise,surprise, he indeed let's it all out in the open.
What was said in that house that night between the two of them it was something they both knew they had it coming.The heat is high and in the midst of the flames and smoke of the burning hearts,the combustion of inflammable feelings and aflame emotions words do come easy and harshly with the sudden lightning of thunder.
So in that winter rainy night a raging Peter throws him out,the artist is already packing and sweating,the homeostatic process of when you don't know where to go,what do to,neither who to talk with.
However what happened next,maybe it was a God's gift,maybe a Fate's yielding or even maybe one of those Devil's expensive presents.
The door bell rings as the artist goes down the stairs on his last way out.
The beautiful blond girl from Groningen is standing right over there,with a bright smile on her face saying Hello,holding the umbrella under the rain.
Jacob Kotsky
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- Yvonne Smit -
Once upon a time they took a taxi to Mona's place.She was still in Rotterdam but one of the house keys was in Antonio Pessoa's pockets.
They had left the baggage at the Central Station and had spent all night on a bar-hop-let's get to know eachother kind of ritual till the first morning light brought them back down to the so called real world.
So by the time they got off the taxi in front of Mona's place they were already quite familiar with the taste and flavour of eachother's lips.Their hearts were pumping fast and their senses were running wild.
They remained in bed for forty eight hours in a row while the home refrigerator's content was being systematically and quickly reduced till very little of it was left,to say the least.
If it was a well verified fact that Antonio Pessoa hadn't specially been leading a life of the abstentious monk kind,it was also a fact that all his eventual multiple casual infatuations hadn't been indeed nothing more than just that.Up to now.
The radio was on,the light was dim,the bodies were sticky as in the steamy tropics,moist with that undried perspiration of the appetites an passions of fleshly desire.
The radio was on and by then,music the only sensual pleasure without vice.
Over and over again they went through the sulfurous atmosphere preceding the orgasmic thunderstorm,resting their souls for short whiles in a daydreaming suspended sleep,gaining consciousness of eachothers heart beats,unspoken feelings,unsounded telepathy,that striking communication zone where no sensory perceptions are required,gaining consciousness of eachothers smells now an exciting intermixture of fluids slowly floating downstream on and along their bodies.
The radio was on,the light was dim,the perfect stage for two of a kind souls to be sharing an everlasting procrastinating extravaganza as the hard rain kept on falling while in that cloudy vapor condensed atmosphere they stuck closer and closer with eachother definitely expecting some more and still much more flooding.
The radio was on and the light was dim,once upon a time in Amsterdam,Nederland.
Jacob Kotsky 
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- a fair trial -
Nevertheless,good things don't last forever,for when Mona got back from Rotterdam,the situation wasn't so funny anymore and the throwing out process went on and on for nearly twenty-four hours with all the required protocol either to give it the proper civilized appearance plus all the due diplomatic procedures or maybe as an excellent opportunity not only to break a little bit the boring routine but eventually to provide the throwing out ceremony with a little spicy drama although as I said,very civilized and very,very diplomatic.
They did it the dutch way.
For Yvonne Smit and Antonio Pessoa,the relocation program just about to take place came as a reluctant obligation they were under once again and therefore the social force binding them to find a new settlement,went on for hours and hours with Martin Camp now , wich presence had been urgently claimed,plus one of Mona's female friends who actually played the role of the one-citizen-committee jury.Tea was served and the judgement delivered.
The commencement speaker presented a forceful speech that impressed everyone,very particularly Yvonne and the artist.The embezzlement at stake although taken lightly - for they were friends after all - was indeed worth having a fair trial court and as the two wrongdoers were respectfully listening to the indictment,more tea was served,cheese,cookies,cherry,marmalade and God knows what else.
Antonio Pessoa most of the time during the fair trial,sat silent and quite making the most of the splendid nourishing food displayed on the table,while the Groningen girl seemed to be having the time of her life letting go her most eloquent verbal defence policy dazzling the audience with her expressive ready facile tongue.
Nevertheless they all knew what the verdict was going to be.Guilty.
So therefore Yvonne Smit and the artist that rainy afternoon were out on the street , happily homeless and helplessly so very much in love.
Jacob Kotsky 
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- Prinsengracht -
Springtime was already immersing Amsterdam in sunshine,bathing the flowering spring trees,the young lovery couple already living in a glamourous apartment,a third floor love nest,where they together celebrating all the best,more than ever,were throwing eachother promises of an ever lasting romance,like in a trance where they both profoundly believed nobody and nothing could possibly tear them apart.
Antonio Pessoa was now in peace,totally convinced he had indeed made it for good.God was by his side after all , and as for the devil the hell with him.
He was still playing with Martin Camp,still rehearsing with the Horny Angel and most important of all he had somehow managed to start painting again.
Antonio Pessoa was more than ever truly fascinated by the life and work of Hieronymus Bosch.Masterpieces such as The Ship of Fools,The Seven Deadly Sins,Christ Crowned with Thorns,The Temptation of Saint Anthony,Witches and very particularly The Garden of Earthly Desires,were among his favourites.
Yvonne Smit shared his interests with the same devotion.
They went to see a Salvador Dali's exhibition and from that moment on Antonio Pessoa became more and more convinced that Hieronymus Bosch was indeed the Godfather of all modern surrealism.
The cosy apartment in Prinsengracht became their uncorrupted paradise,while their bodies became more and more their main communication tools.Sex was fantastic and being so madly in love to such a degree as indeed it was a fact back in those days,was something which Antonio Pessoa had never felt before to that or to any extent whatsoever,for all that matters.
That Springtime in Prinsengracht,their love relationship was reaching the dazzling heights of the vertigo,the whirling sensations of a magical dizzy spell,the pinnacle of all sexual possibilities.So far so good.Reaching the Nirvana through Kama Sutra.
What else was an artist supposed to wish?Love,freedom,fullfillment,passion,music,Amsterdam and Art.
Yvonne Smit tells him every sigle day,countless times,he is her miracle and that she definitely doesn't want to loose him.Never!
Jacob Kotsky 
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- Vincent Van Gogh -
The artist not yet fully satisfied with his knowledgeability of the post-impressionism movement goes once again through Vincent Van Gogh's biography and in the process of so doing actually does a reasonable amount of study researches of the dutch artist paintings.However,taking from his personal perspective Van Gogh's Sunflowers doesn't seem to interest him much,on the other hand The Starry Nights has a magnetic effect on Antonio Pessoa's visual and emotional sensibility.
For many years to come Antonio Pessoa goes systematically back and about Vincent Van Gogh's biography,supposedly trying to make out the real source of Van Gogh's eternal punishment on earth,the general stigma which made him live such a short and tragic life till his dramatic suicide.
Years later,Antonio Pessoa going through Pablo Picasso's biography,besides discovering the unexpected convergence to his own ideas on how real life and artwork should be walking hand in hand,furthermore finds the personification of optimist as the ultimate antidote for the average depressive emotional stunning self-destructive kamikaze impulses of not only Van Gogh but indeed of so many artists of the twentieth century.
Yvonne Smit follows his interests always with her up-to-dateness enthusiasm keeping him company twenty four hours a day and participating the best way she knows how.
Antonio Pessoa tells her " I wish I could paint like Van Gogh,but I wouldn't like to live like he did".Yvonne Smit assures him,"Take my word for granted,you won't".
Antonio Pessoa and his Van Gogh's obsession is going to be one of his Art History preoccupations which is going to last for quite a long while.He believes Vincent Van Gogh of all the post-impressionists is definitely the only one succeeding a true remarkable sight for art expression despite his sad hypochondriacal nature.
The apartment in Prinsengracht is now a home studio,drawings,sketches and watercolors scattered all over the place,as fertilizers over the lawn,translating Antonio Pessoa's insatiable desire to reach the final authority on Art History and very particularly on Vincent Van Gogh's life and work.
Jacob Kotsky 
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- procrastinating -
Antonio Pessoa is so happy in his Prinsengracht apartment and so very much in love with Yvonne Smit,between his Great Masters biographies reading,his drawings and watercolors,long strolls across the Vondel Park hand in hand with the woman of his dreams,that as days and weeks go by he begins to forget his music-biz commitments to the point of actually consigning those professional responsibilities to a remote confinement,to say the least.
These days they are waking up late afternoon after long pleasurable nights love making,hooked on their wild sex endless experimental sessions,becoming two souls in one body,two bodies in one hallucinating overwhelming ecstasy,becoming more and more a compact uncontrolled delirious frantic mad whirl of pleasure,a high-voltage fleshly action togetherness.
So therefore it is in this stage of delicious demented excess that Antonio Pessoa enters a period of exhaled divine procrastinating voluntary exile,enjoying and making the most,and beyond the most,of this luxurious epicurean banquet,the magnificent gratification of the senses,all night long in a love's nest in Prinsengracht with a wide panoramic window overlooking at the canal.
Yvonne Smit,the ingenious "innocent bystander" was dragging him to the foxhole,the twilight zone,the so called trap where once you get in you soon going to learn how hard and painful is the process of getting out.
So by the time the dutch musicians of the Horny Angel and Martin Camp started complaining,the artist and his muse were already to far away flying high up in the sky to even bother to come back down to earth,at least to respectfully give them a fair enough explanation.
The awkward situation was created and it seemed there was no way back.From then on the dice are going to roll as never before,from then on fate is going to send Antonio Pessoa a "it's no good idea to be messing around with me" message and sure thing he is going to keep it in his mind,heart and soul for the rest of his life.
Jacob Kotsky 
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- out of the Garden of Earthly Desires -
Just as in with the domino effect,the procrastinating ritual didn't have to wait too long before the unexpected inevitable consequences started to react and hit real hard playing his evil cards on the undercover of pressure.If Antonio Pessoa was caught by surprise it was crazy as it seems indeed,for he should have known all the way he had it coming,sooner or later,in fact just a matter of time - Yvonne Smit was indeed the first to stand still,tension all over her system,before the announcement of harsh reality once again promulgating a hard rain was about to fall.She was indeed the first to get up and out of the procrastinating after midnight idleness,the first to actually set up the situation table and the one who had enough guts - so to speak - to set boundaries as far as Antonio Pessoa's social and professional alienation was concerned.
The Horny Angel's dutch musicians weren't counting on Antonio Pessoa anymore,as a matter of fact they were actually at the dangerous point of rupture,their minds basically made up for a definite break up in relations.
As for Martin Camp,he was digesting the situation the british way.Antonio Pessoa pops by,Martin welcomes him at the entrance door with a wide open polite english smile,tea is relaxing served as they pleasantly talk about the weather.However they know eachother to well by then so as Antonio looks up into his eyes he sees and feels the unmistakable sullen resentful glistening glitter.While Martin serves them more tea with a shred of milk the tension is in the air and it weights a ton.
Anyway,despite the love she feels for the artist,Yvonne Smit is once again the first red light to stop the procrastinating traffic and therefore to admit the oppressive feeling from the heavy force making the most to bow them down by the weight of responsibility.
It's time to go to bed,this time just for sleeping,wake up in the morning for a cold shower,breakfast and a long long walk along the canal streets to talk things over.
By the end of the day they both had to admit they had jumped off a cliff for a long long fall over to the Garden of Earthly Desires.
They both admit they are helplessly hooked on eachother,by the end of the day they both admit it's just about time for a short holiday in northern Nederland.
Groningen!
Jacob Kotsky
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- Groningen -
Yvonne Smit and the artist make love in the train's toilet on their way to Groningen.The hell with it,they are young lovers crazy about eachother.Making the most of every single moment and savoring the rules breaking,laughing at the world and taking the risk of the social status suicide kind.
Yvonne Smit isn't by all means concerned about the futur and Antonio Pessoa has the ever-present supporting structure of his multiple talents,skills,trades command,his easy going communicative nature plus a wealthy family ready to eventually provide him with a financial and emotional rescue right on the spot,anywhere,anytime.
They are going to stay in Groningen for one week.
At the Grote Markt they visit the Drie Gezusters cafe which for the artist is love at first sight.He sits at the piano to get the feel of its touch while contemplating the great collection of oil paintings displayed on the walls.He simply adores it!
Yvonne Smit's parents give them shelter and a comfortable familiar atmosphere with not to many questions to go with it.
The dutch girl introduces him to Marguerite,her best friend who happens to be having a not particularly fullfilling affair with a young millionaire named Rick.
Yvonne shows him around Groningen,telling him her childhood adventures,glory days and misfortunes.It's their first time away from Amsterdam and it sure feels like a refreshing change.
However by midweek Antonio Pessoa is already missing Amsterdam and very specifically his Prinsengracht bird's nest.He misses the lively stimulating rhythm of the big city,the cosmopolitan ambience,the excitement influence,Melkweg and the Vondel Park.
As he sits once again at the Drie Gezusters grand piano he's once again aware of an awkward feeling of lost,a strange unfullfilled vacuum chamber which he isn't quite able to define let alone get rid of it.
He looks at Yvonne drinking a cup of coffee and smiling at him,pride and joy in her eyes,knowing he is helplessly in love with her,a sort of ceaseless emotional tumult he had never felt before,whatsoever.
And for the first time in his life he was actually yet experiencing a feeling he hadn't come across so far.
Fear!
Jacob Kotsky 
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- Love, Passion...or Lust ! -
On their way back to Amsterdam , as the train speeds up,they both sit awkwardly quiet,somehow sullen and thoughtful,heedful of the consciousness warnings.
Was Amsterdam the right place for them,after all?Were they still in love or just hooked on eachother?Yvonne Smit now begins to be fully aware that the artist was dropping all his interests behind for the lust's sake.Something was very wrong about this affair,the values didn't quite fit anymore,the wonderful whole was now beginning to look like a meteoritical feelings hard rain.Deep down inside,Antonio Pessoa knew he had it all,he could go anywhere,anytime and have a living and a life.However he begins to be aware that a stronger sickening overspread passion was gaining control upon his system.Lust!
Mixed up feelings were beginning to quickly grow between the two of them.The only way out was to run away.However for the time being that was definitely out of question.
Bewilderment and confusion were playing their cards,a cloudy perception of life was taking over as a gigantic wave of evil passions,awkward ambivalences.
Antonio Pessoa this time had been caught off guard,this time mad love,passion...or lust , had been the big blow which caught him napping.
The easy going infatuations were a dream of the past and now the artist felt himself like a fly trapped in a spider's web labyrinth.
Loosing control upon the situation,the crossroads start feeling like a desperate anxious acute pain,an agony of doubt like the torments of the damned.
Nevertheless the flavour of her lips,the warmth of her body,the touch of her hands let alone the climax in the flood tide of the contact supreme,was becoming the dangerous disease of the tearful embrace kind.
However,Yvonne Smit was in no better emotional condition than he was.
Two young helpless spellbound libidinous victims too arrogant to the point of going on feeding the belief they were two beautiful Gods having holidays on earth.
But even well off beliefs need a true genuine and solid as a rock structure to back them up in order to let them go on living and survive!
Jacob Kotsky
Antonio Pessoa - Amsterdam
- sensitive topics stand -
If Antonio Pessoa by then was already a skillfull musician and painter,let alone his extroverted communicative cheerful,charismatic,magnetic personality,a qualities confluence which is going to,shall we say,keep him company throughout his life so far,on the other hand his lack of patience,bad-natured tolerance of delay and very often incompetence,his rather childish chimerical spontaneousness,this restless untamed inner tendency to go through life without constraint...definitely has marked his destiny's course of conduct,either leading him apart from interesting professional opportunities or crazy as it seems preventing him from going through the unpleasurable trouble of face-to-face confrontations with unreasonable awkward situations.
Nevertheless,one way or another this short and rather concise portrait of Antonio Pessoa's nature and contradictory aspects,might gives us an idea,explanation or interpretation tools,providing us with more solid ground references in order to better understand the reasons behind the artist's apparently complex reactions and eventually patent nonsense concerning specific situations or even the whole perspective of his adventurous life,a man always eager and willing to undertake or even seeking out new and daring enterprises,however always ready to give it all away at the first signs of distress,psychological damage,or the whole bunch of the general adversity kind.
Once established these sensitive topics,we are now a lot closer to an accurate reproduction of the true and real motivations of the artist,the measurement of his personality certainly provides us with a good enough foundation for comparison,reference points or anything which can actually help us to evaluate Antonio Pessoa's maneuvers throughout his life.
Furthermore,as far as his artwork is concerned,once again this global understanding of this ubiquitous man,sure comes up as a Must when it comes to the process of evaluating piece after piece of Antonio Pessoa's astronomical high quality artistic production up to now.
Jacob Kotsky
- Rembrandt van Rijn -
Back to Prinsengracht,Antonio Pessoa and Yvonne Smit once again settle down,this time on a delicate Let's See What Happens kind of atmosphere.
The artist is postponing the inevitable confrontation with the dutch band,The Horny Angel and with Martin Camp as well.He is absolutely obsessed with Yvonne and real life commitments start to be digested as a persistent annoyance,a haunting obligation which he isn't in the mood to be indebted for anymore.
On the beautiful days they spend their afternoons at the Vondel Park,hand in hand,playing with eachother like two teenagers living their first summer romance.
Now they are visiting the Rijks Museum at Stadhouderskade on a weekly basis while Antonio Pessoa starts seriously focusing his attention and academic interest in Rembrandt van Rijn.They also pay frequent visits to the Rembrandt House at Jodenbreestraat.Antonio Pessoa becomes profoundly impressed with Rembrandt's etchings and drawings so next thing they knew their apartment of Prinsengracht is stocked with Rembrandt van Rijn's art books plus a countless number of studies and new versions Antonio Pessoa is doing inspired in the dutch Master's oils.
Although the young artist is plenty aware that he is bound for the contemporary concept he feels desperately the urgency to do an intensive research concerning the Old Masters,a personal commitment and ritual Antonio Pessoa is going to establish as one of his academic priorities,by then and throughout most of his life till 2002,period when he apparently becomes respectfully satisfied at last.Satisfied with his Art History knowledge let alone all the valuable tutored technical tips and tricks he believes to be absolutely basic and fundamental,the essential tools he religiously believes to be crucial information to the completion of his contemporary art project.
Therefore,Rembrandt van Rijn is going to be one of Antonio Pessoa's number one references and one of his favourite adored Masters ever.
Jacob Kotsky
- the Horny Angel's assembly -
They were all sitting around the table at the huge basement where the Horny Angel had their rehearsal sessions within the Vondel Park's bridge.And sure they were there for no Poker game
and by all means no one of them seemed to be holding the highest-ranking hand.The proceedings consisting of the examination of issues looking forward for the final determination of Antonio Pessoa's innocence or guilt was taking place.
The defendant side by side with his lover-attorney looks bored,slightly spaced-out,impatiently looking at his wristwatch every five minutes anxiously waiting to get it over with and go home.
After a very diplomatic chitchat indeed the jury presented the verdict which was very clear and straight to the point.
Antonio Pessoa's latest attitude and behavioral profile was demonstrating no signs of genuine professional commitment whatsoever.
Antonio Pessoa's beguiling and short speech showed the "supreme court" his admitted surrendering capitulation meantime Yvonne Smit,the reliable defense attorney standing on behalf of the sued defendant,claims and pledges that all Antonio Pessoa needs is a short break to sleep on it.And that was it.The pledge was signed with a toast of Heineken beer followed by several kisses and handshakes as to acknowledge the agreement.
The Horny Angel's short break is going to turn out to be indeed an endless break,for they aren't going to play together anymore,ever again.Whether or not it was a bad decision making,a unfavorable combination of circumstances giving away a golden opportunity,that is something we will never know,although one thing seems to be a quite reasonable assumption.Antonio Pessoa's gulf between himself and the music scene might as well have been the beginning of the gradual increase of his total commitment to fine arts as indeed happened years later.
As they left the Vondel Park hand in hand and strangely silent a piece of the past had just been left behind and somehow they were both slightly aware of it.They didn't look back over their shoulders not even once for deep down inside they also both knew it didn't matter much anymore.
As a matter of fact they both were already feeling by then that even their love affair,it was a question of time before it had its turn on the down the hill go,the final countdown time slow.
Jacob Kotsky
- the american art dealer -
One of the reasons why many years later a great amount of Antonio Pessoa's oils,drawings and watercolors were found in private collections in the U.S.A. in places such as New York city,Boston,Washington,DC,Chicago and Indianopolis,was the action role of an american art dealer living in Amsterdam,named Lee Roberts.
Antonio Pessoa had met him at the Melkweg's Tea House years before and now they stumbled upon eachother once again this time at a restaurant called Egg Cream just off Dam square.
Lee Roberts is a gay colored man,arrogant , with a big glittering smile and a Big Mouth to go with ,if you get my drift...
From the very first moment-impact Lee Roberts and Yvonne Smit aren't going to stand eachother,not even a little bit,not then and never ever after.Nevertheless Lee Roberts as far as business was concerned was a straightforward man,serious and fast.
He buys all Antonio Pessoa's latest production scattered all over the Prinsengracht apartment,lying strewn all over the floor.The artist is once again back in business and back down to work.
Lee Roberts lives in a fancy mansion in Amsterdam North and every two months goes over to New York City for one week or two.Antonio Pessoa asks him no questions,not being at all the curious sort of person,besides his mind body and soul are a togetherness too much too busy with his artwork let alone his increasingly temperamental rebellious Yvonne Smit.
Due to the wrong chemistry between the american playboy and the Groningen girl,the artist and the art dealer have their private business meetings in Amsterdam North.
Lee Roberts seems to be fascinated with Antonio Pessoa's speed of action and very particularly with his striking creativity.
In Lee Roberts opinion the artist has this unique natural inner instinct to give art lovers and art collectors what they want,so therefore the artwork sales pretty soon come to support his theory.Their partnership is based on pooling talent and money,fast and easy,the american way,no special beating about the bush pseudoscientific headaches required,just a plain hitting the big-time two partners association.
Antonio Pessoa was back in art production and Lee Roberts producing a real stimulating good profit !
Jacob Kotsky
- as time goes by -
Yvonne looks charming and beautiful with the springtime colors,smiling and delighted by witenessing Antonio's fast improvement as he enthusiastically paints on canvas bizarre unconventional neo-impressionist situations ,most of them with this uniqueness touch and feel about them , romantic,sensual and by all means autobiographic.
Yvonne usually sits at the table by the window drinking coffee and watching the artist moving around the easel like a ballet dancer,enjoying every single moment of it.All distress between them is dissolved under the spell of fine arts magic.
She could stay with him for the rest of her life,she had told him so many times "baby,I'm crazy about you,you're my miracle,I don't wanna loose you".
They were two of a kind,passionate,stubborn,lustful,interactive,
sexy,impulsive...and wild!They were too much too young as well,overbearing pride looking and valorously fragile.They were like two children playing with eachother and getting a great kick out of it,disdaining the tricky and depressing consequences,once again in the naive belief that virtue is of more moment than security.
Public kissing was for them as natural as good conversation,just like their sex performances anywhere,anytime,in a pub's toilet,in the Park under the bushes,
in the darkness of a cinema,savouring the excitement of the danger,the hank panky's thrill,the one they enjoyed the most,the swift release of the sexual forces,the quick rush sensation,the roar of their hearts engines as they indeed went on getting a big bang out of it.
They were caught in a trap,they supposedly knew the risk at stake,they instinctively knew it,still they grabbed the temptation's flow,took the bait,bravely stuck with eachother,over the edge,jumping off a cliff straight over to divine madness,a boisterous knockabout winds and waves of fierce lust thunders roaring them their music.
At a certain point of the love story they both knew they were on
a delicious drawn-out,hooked on a weird mutual bondage but still the show had to go on for they had nothing to loose but their sanity,their sound powers of mind,body and soul.
Totally barmy,as time goes by, they are both experiencing the most delirious affair of their lives,the mad whirl of pleasure and the painful madness of love.
Jacob Kotsky
- Denise and Valerie -
Lee Roberts was a smart good-humoured jolly good fellow,an amiable villain with a cocky sidelong grin,meaning business but also goodtime.He was as gay as gay can be,bound for gay-lesbians bars almost everynight.So therefore after their business pleasurable meetings at his palace in Amsterdam North very often he drags Antonio Pessoa in to another gay bar-hop till morning light.And that particular night the artist was swept up by the events,acquainting with two english sweetheart lesbians from Liverpool and living in Amsterdam , south Herengracht.
Valerie and Denise were two lesbian friends living together although nothing at all going on between them,but close friendship.
Denise was the most boyish,male-like of the two and Valerie a cheerful kind roly-poly face gentle and sentimental young woman.They loved David Bowie and from that night on they got to love Antonio Pessoa.
Lee Roberts had disappeared in the arms of a tall dutch leather dressed bear,Denise,Valerie and Antonio went on and on celebrating life the english way,meaning drinking and drinking,talking and laughing.By seven in the morning Denise and Valerie were holding Antonio Pessoa out on the empty street preventing him from falling stiff drunk down on the sidewalk.
They called a taxi and brought him home with them.
While they slept all day long,something very wrong was going on over in Prinsengracht.There stands a sleepless woman,smoking cigarette after cigarette with an explosive growing anger building up in her guts,body,mind and soul.Her
heart is cold but her feelings are ablaze,lighted up by burning suspicious jealousy,distrustful by some definitely queer goings-on.She looks through the windows glass at the first morning light,shivering inside,replacing the few pink dreams left by a very ghostly nightmare.
While Antonio Pessoa is sleeping like a log on the couch of the Herengracht house living room,Yvonne Smit is packing her things,quietly closing the entrance door and taking a taxi bound for the Central Station.
From this day onward nothing is going to be quite the same for the artist and his muse.Destiny was once again playing his evil tricky cards and the innocence tree about to loose its roots and ready to disperse the springtime leaves across the fields of resentment,bitterness and emotional chaos.
Jacob Kotsky
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