The Artist
a (dys)/(u)topian story by Brian Sellnow
I will let you decide if the following depiction of the future is a utopia or a dystopia. However, as a writer and creative, I’m firmly in the camp of the latter. I think you will be, too, if you are here.
The Artist
by Brian Sellnow
“Good morning, Demetrius,” Betty chirped.
Demetrius opened his eyes, squinting at the sunlight through the large window.
“How are you feeling today?”
“Fine,” he grunted.
He always felt fine. His body was a miracle of medical technology, every muscle and organ working to perfection. Somewhere, one or two or three copies of him rested in vats, brain-dead and waiting to supply replacements for anything that went wrong. Demetrius didn’t like to think about that. Long ago, the last of his colleagues had refused medical treatment, leaving him alone to carry on.
Betty stood beside his bed. The factory had programmed her to respond to that name, even though the familiar boxy shape of his Personal Assistant was no more feminine than his furniture. Humanoid robots were back in fashion, but Demetrius found the idea repellent. People were people, robots were robots, and that’s how it should have stayed. In humanizing their machines, people had given up their own humanity, and never realized it. The company that had built Betty, long ago, had offered many times to upgrade her software and make her smarter. Demetrius had resisted that, allowing only necessary maintenance.
Betty was gray and white, like everything else in his house. Demetrius found colors too distracting. The sunlight flowed over the white sheets and blankets of his bed, warmed the gray stone floor. The bed was large and comfortable, and there was no good reason to get out of it. On the other hand, he had little desire to stay in it. His options for almost everything in life were between unpleasant outcomes, and his personal wishes no longer mattered. How many thousands of times had he risen from this bed? He didn’t want to think about that, either.
He sat up, slowly, and stretched. Once upon a time, he would have looked at a clock to see what time it was. Now he didn’t have a clock. It didn’t matter, and if he really wanted to know, Betty would tell him.
“Anything on my agenda today?”
“You have an appointment with Conservator Ilyaka at three in the afternoon. There are no other appointments scheduled.”
Betty was a terrible conversationalist. Demetrius appreciated that—he had long ago gotten tired of conversation. No one ever said anything he hadn’t heard many times before.
“Good. Go make coffee.”
Betty turned and left the bedroom, her treads silent on the stone floor. Demetrius sighed. The last visit with a Conservator had not gone well. Demetrius had written a book about children finding a hidden garden and discovering all of the secrets within. The story was full of subtle metaphors as the children explored the magical place but also discovered truths about themselves. The Conservator had gushed vacuously about how wonderful it was, then suggested adding a singing pony, and Demetrius threw the man out of his house. Hopefully his replacement would have some sense.
He walked to the window and looked down at his garden. Flowers, grass, fruit trees. The pond with the small bridge and brightly colored fish swimming in random patterns, going nowhere. The table where he often ate breakfast, surrounded by this small facsimile of nature. All carefully manicured and cared for by robots, which were programmed to stay out of his sight. For a long time, he had done all the work himself, until he finally grew bored with it. Perhaps he would start again, just as a change of pace. He would eventually get tired of it again, of course.
The garden was a stark contrast to the world beyond his front door. On the rare occasions when Demetrius left his house, he found himself assaulted by a constant barrage of dreadful music at unbearable volumes, competing and clashing in an incessant cacophony. Video screens were everywhere, repeating the same insipid non-dramas about people being happy and nice to each other. The plots were minimal and endlessly recycled by the computers, the actors indistinguishable and interchangeable. The citizens around him didn’t seem to notice the music and stared at the screens in rapt attention that Demetrius found horrifying. Given a moment of peace and quiet to think, they wouldn’t know what to do.
The coffee was fresh and good. For a while, the quality had declined, until he complained about it. That’s the way it was with everything. It just gradually got worse, and nobody noticed. Robots didn’t care about how coffee was supposed to taste, or how clothes fit, how bad music had become. The current musical fad (unless it had been replaced by something equally awful) was something called Afro-Asian Fusion, but it was all utter crap, just computers following algorithms to produce meaningless noise. Demetrius listened to music that everyone else had forgotten and had no ability to appreciate.
#
He had just begun eating lunch when his guest arrived. He could ask Betty what time it was and be told it was three o’clock precisely, so he didn’t bother. These people were polite and prompt, he had to give them credit for that. Then he snorted in derision. They were polite because they didn’t know how to be otherwise, punctual because they slavishly obeyed the instructions of their robot Assistants.
He went to his front door.
“Conservator Ilyaka. How nice of you to visit. Do come in.”
Conservator Ilyaka had cinnamon skin, dark eyes, and slightly curly black hair. Once, Demetrius would have called her pretty. Now, he wouldn’t be able to pick her out of a crowd. Did everybody really look the same, or did he just not bother to look anymore? It didn’t matter. Nothing did, actually.
Beside her stood her Assistant, a humanoid robot with a moronic, genial expression on its face. Demetrius ushered Ilyaka inside, closing the door before the robot could attempt to follow.
Ilyaka looked startled by that, and glanced around in wonder at the entry.
“So big! And it’s all in white.”
So, she hadn’t been here before, was new to the job. Demetrius had been wondering if he had simply forgotten her. People were forgettable, nowadays. Hopefully someone had told her what this job entailed.
“Please, come in,” he said. “I was just sitting down to lunch. Will you join me?”
Ilyaka looked uncomfortable with that idea. “I’ve, ah, already eaten, thank you.”
Of course she had. Probably at exactly twelve o’clock, with her Assistant standing at her elbow, ready to tell her when to get back to work.
“Well,” said Demetrius, “I’m not going to let my soup get cold, and you can’t just sit there and watch me eat. So you may either join me at the table, or wait here until I’m done.”
He’d given her a difficult choice. Her Assistant was on the other side of the door. Sitting here in the entry, doing nothing, would be intolerable. She smiled, weakly.
“Then I will join you.”
Lunch was soup and bread, both made by Demetrius. Everyone else had forgotten how to cook, almost certainly never thought about the possibility of doing so. Demetrius pointed Ilyaka toward a chair, then brought her soup and bread and a glass of wine before returning to his own meal. The table was large enough to seat eight, but there had never been that many people in Demetrius’ house.
Ilyaka tried the soup. Her eyes narrowed, the closest thing to an unpleasant reaction she could manage.
“This is... different.”
“It’s made with real vegetables,” said Demetrius. “And it has seasoning in it, from the garden. You’ve probably never had those before.”
“I came to see what you’ve been up to, lately.” Out of habit, she turned to look for her Assistant, who was still no doubt waiting patiently outside the front door.
Demetrius smiled. “Painting, writing, music. The usual.”
Ilyaka smiled back. “And do we have anything to present to your public? They’ve been waiting for something new.”
They were always waiting for something new. The rest of the world had had creativity bred out of it, had the attention span of a two-year old, and was plagued by constant boredom.
“A few things are almost done. A story that I just need to clean up, a portrait that’s nearly ready. I’ve been playing around with a piece of music that could be interesting.”
“How wonderful,” Ilyaka exclaimed, and nibbled tentatively at the bread. She looked at it carefully before setting it back on the plate, and took a sip of wine.
“Do you eat this kind of food, all the time?”
“Yes,” said Demetrius, trying to hide his disgust. “Careful with the wine. You’ll get drunk and have a headache.”
Ilyaka looked at him in confusion. The idea that eating or drinking something could cause a negative result was obviously as unfamiliar as the food itself.
“And how are you doing, Artist? Personally.”
“I continue my work,” Demetrius replied. “It’s my duty to keep Art alive in this world. I try to bring new ideas to my audience, give them something to think about and make them happy.”
“And we are grateful for that. Although that’s not the impression Temer had when he left here. He was trying to be nice.”
Demetrius had forgotten the man’s name.
“You people don’t have to try to be nice. You’re conditioned for it, have no choice. You’ve no more free will than the robots who attend you.”
Ilyaka looked again for her Assistant, probably for reassurance. She started to speak, but paused as if for thought. An unusual reaction, and Demetrius watched her more closely.
“Surely, Artist, being nice to others is a good thing, is it not?”
“Not,” growled Demetrius, “when you have no other option.” But he would have to be careful with this one. If she could think for herself, she could be offended, and he would have to be polite.
#
Lunch concluded, Demetrius pushed himself back from the table, the signal for Betty to begin cleaning up. Ilyaka watched.
“Such a primitive Assistant. It’s strange that you live in such luxury, but have so little technology in the house. All this space for one person, and you cook your own food. They told me about that, but it’s still hard to believe.”
The wine had made her talkative.
“Come,” he said, “and I will show you what I’ve been up to.”
She followed him upstairs to the atelier, complimenting him on the house but thankfully not babbling like her predecessor. He led her down the short hallway and opened the door.
The floor was black and white stone, in intricate, swirling geometric patterns. Huge windows let in the sunlight, and chandeliers let him work at night. To the left, every kind of musical instrument. Horns of any type, drums, a piano. A clarinet and an oboe nestled next to a saxophone, an Arabic ney leaned against a sitar. There was a violin, a cello, a bass fiddle. Demetrius was a one-man symphony orchestra, playing while Betty recorded.
To the right, his bookshelves and writing desk. The computer terminal on the desk was a concession to technology, but an ancient typewriter sat next to it, a half-written page still protruding. In the middle of the room, an easel held a canvas with a portrait outlined but not yet painted. A woman, standing with her hands before her, as if to either embrace something or ward it off. Brushes and paint were scattered on a small table next it, and Betty had cleaned any paint from the floor and readied his palette for use.
Ilyaka stood transfixed, like a devout Catholic on her first tour of the Vatican. She had seen the results of Demetrius’ work, as had everyone else on the planet, but had never considered the effort it took to produce them. Examining the canvas, she finally found her tongue.
“What is this a picture of?”
Demetrius scowled. It wasn’t a “picture” of anything—it was an original work, something that came from within himself. He had begun it, lost inspiration, started again when he couldn’t remember his initial intent. He had penciled in the facial expression a few times, erasing it shortly thereafter.
“A woman,” he replied, “looking at something.”
“Ah.” She wandered to his writing desk. “And you said you have a story, almost written? What is that about?”
“A murder mystery,” he told her.
“Murder? Killing?” She looked interested and somewhat nervous, the strongest reaction he would get from her.
Demetrius had written a story about a murder, a few years ago, and it had not been well received. Everyone read it, of course, and said how wonderful it was. But they could not grasp the idea of wanting to hurt someone so badly, and how could you do so without being recorded by the omnipresent robots and cameras? Demetrius had tried a different tack with this one.
“A man tricks another man into killing himself. Then he dies in an accident. When Satan comes to claim his soul, they have an argument about who the guilty party actually is.”
Ilyaka nodded, not understanding a word. She certainly had never had a conversation like this before. “I’m sure it will be very popular.”
Of course it would be. And then promptly forgotten, as was everything he created.
“That reminds me,” said Ilyaka as she reached into her bag. “I brought you a present.”
She withdrew a small package. An ancient paperback book, carefully sealed in a plastic bag. Demetrius noted the title: “Nancy Drew, The Clue of the Broken Locket.” Written for children, centuries ago.
“I read through it,” said Ilyaka. “I’m afraid I couldn’t understand it very well.”
By which she meant why the characters acted as they did. Anyone else would not even realize that, just read without comprehension and be satisfied with the momentary distraction. Demetrius framed his response carefully.
“Of course you couldn’t. To appreciate a story, to understand it, you must empathize with the characters, be able to put yourself in their place. You must understand the meaning behind the words. You people have created a society without emotion, without meaning. You’ve eliminated drama from your lives, why would you understand it in a story?”
Ilyaka laid the book carefully on his desk. “We live in a world without violence, Artist. A world with justice for all, safe for all.”
“Bah.” Demetrius had had this argument a million times before in his head, and the answers were always the same. The price of their safety had been high.
“You live in a world devoid of passion, a world without hate because it’s a world without love. You have no fear of violence because nobody does anything.”
“Every person has food and a safe place to live. Surely that is an accomplishment.” She looked almost frightened now. No one had ever dared to challenge her view of the world, suggest that things might be different.
“You live in a prison,” said Demetrius, “of your own making. No bars or guards, yet you dare not step outside the boundaries, never think of doing so. The food you eat is pap, your citizens live in dormitories like rats in a cage, tended by their robot masters.”
“But you have this house,” said Ilyaka. “And the food you like...”
“Another prison,” Demetrius replied, waving his arm at the room. “Luxurious by your standards, a prison nonetheless.”
“You can go anywhere you desire.” Her tone bordered on petulant, now.
“And where would I go? Every one of your cities looks the same now. Moscow or Mexico City, I could see the same thing by walking out the door. Everything worth seeing was built a thousand years ago, if any of it remains, and I have seen it all a thousand times.”
“And that is why we need you, Artist.” Ilyaka was trying to soothe him. Unfortunately, she had brought up the worst of his grievances.
“And that is why you cannot let me die, you mean. To create stories and music that are loved by everyone, appreciated by none. Among all the billions upon this planet, not a single other person can create a work of art.”
“It is your duty, Artist. To the human race.”
Demetrius sat, sulking, on the piano bench. That was the same answer he always came up with as well, and he had never found a counter to it. Was there truly no other creative person on Earth? He had tried to train others. They had followed his teaching to the letter, learning to play music and paint according to his instructions. Their stories were pale plagiarism, and not a one of the candidates showed any signs of originality. They had brought a child, once, to live with Demetrius. The boy had been enthusiastic, then started to act erratically. Demetrius argued that it was typical and normal childish behavior, but they had taken the boy away for therapy and that experiment was never repeated.
“I’m tired, Conservator. Tired of living. Tired of this pointless existence. Go, tell your superiors that the painting will be done in a few days, the story as well. More entertainment for the masses.”
Ilyaka walked to the door, then turned back.
“You underestimate your importance, Artist. It may be true that we lack passion and initiative, that we need something to give our lives meaning. You are that spark.” With that, she departed.
#
Demetrius sat there for a long time, not moving. Time meant nothing to an immortal.
A spark. An interesting and inadvertent metaphor, one surely not made consciously. He walked to the window and looked out at the endless sprawl of indistinguishable buildings, teeming with their faceless residents. Could they be the tinder? What would happen, if he could set the world on fire?
The music was in his head, now. The mournful sound of an oboe or duduk, lamenting the death of humanity. Then the horns, a trumpet blast, signaling a march. A clash of cymbals as the destruction began. Yes, it would work. He would rewrite that argument with Satan, let people know of the devilish bargain they had fallen victim to, and there would be more stories after that. He moved to the canvas, put paint on the palette. Forgoing a sketch, he painted a look of horror to fill in the blank face. He didn’t remember who she was supposed to be originally, but now she was the monster who had conquered the human race, had destroyed its spirit. Crimson and amber, for the flames around her and the blood on her hands.
“Look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair.”
People would see this portrait, and remember it.
The Artist’s duty would be fulfilled.
Meet the author:
Brian Sellnow lives in Las Vegas, where he writes science fiction, fantasy and horror stories while listening to dark ambient music, and occasionally smokes cigars in the garden.
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