Always blessed—or cursed—with the ability to draw, I was something of a protégé at school.
For that reason, and that reason alone, I would be commandeered by teachers for any project that required a modicum of draftsmanship—from school fetes to Nativity plays, I was the man, or boy for the job.
It also singled me out with the hard- knocks in my class, who would demand with menaces that I undertake their art homework for them.
So what if the others were getting occasional plaudits and credit for my hard work I consoled myself that at least it was still my art that lined the walls of the school, and pretty soon I got wise and began charging sweets for it.
Then one day, there was a big to-do about what Eugene Webster had done in the bogs (vernacular for toilets).
Eugene was a new addition, and hadn’t endeared himself beyond new-kid status, as such, he was the buttress of every gobbing mouth and tripping sneaker. As I made my way through the excited throng of snotty noses and grubby elbows, I could see Eugene being frogmarched by his earlobe by one of the teachers. The collected mob began chanting his name,-“Eugene!Eugene!EUGENE!” as I edged forward to the open toilets.
What greeted me was a nauseating familiar stench, and Eugene’s name, smeared in shit across the grey wall.
Whatever I did artistically at the school after that, would always forever be eclipsed by what Eugene had done.
It was probably my first introduction to contemporary art.
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