What Is Art?

Are you ready to read a story full of deception, reversals, and fatal allure? The Time and Art is about more than her. It is about the god in every one of us for whom we would willingly destroy ourselves. Art is no temple; it is an altar. And Gu Xunzhen is the one who makes us walk willingly toward it. Yes, I never loved art. I was merely an observer in an invisibility cloak, using technique to earn extra credit. But she became a legend, the only “artist” to break through the sky, the myth itself. I thought I knew everything about her, from her early awkwardness to her triumph, and then her sudden fall and complete disappearance from the art world. I thought I had always been a cool-headed chronicler, watching everyone involved in her life act like frenzied players in a drama while I remained detached. I wrote her story. I wrote about how art wears the trappings of divinity while the bones of ordinary people pave the road beneath it. I wrote that if art and love were fused, we would all become slaves who, even after descending into hysteria, would still willingly crawl at its feet.

But I lied. When the story reaches its end, I will tear away every disguise. I am no observer, but the most cowardly and the most frenzied actor in her drama. “Art,” as I speak of it, has always been nothing more than another name for her. Everything I have told is merely meant to conceal the real truth: how I gave up everything for her, what passed between us, and the true reason she chose to disappear. This is a novel about art and lies, worship and sacrifice. When you finish the final word, you will understand.