AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Next to me, Wolfgang raises his hand. “Excuse me, Professor?”
“Did you find your balls?” Professor Turner inquires, brows raised.
“Yes. I generally keep them next to my dick.”
Everyone in the room audibly pulls air into their mouths.
“Finally,” the professor proclaims, approval lacing his tone. “Someone with gumption and worth talking to. What was your question?”
“Is the syllabus supposed to be blank?”
Like everyone else in the room, I scan the handout. The front is a printout of information about the professor and pertinent information like office hours, a phone number, and an email address are listed. I turn over the page to find it empty, excluding the wordSyllabusat the top.
“Yes.” Professor Turner pushes himself off his haphazard seat and begins to roam about the room. “You only have one assignment in here, but I’m not going to tell you what that is. That’s for you to decide. This is an upper-level class, and it’s up to you to find your own path. I will only be here to advise you. For this class, you will choose and work on one project of your liking. It can be whatever you want and with any medium. You have freedom to choose. Let your mind and talents guide you. The only stipulation is that it has to make a statement of some kind—whether that is about you, the world, poverty, hunger, the universe, or iced tea. I don’t care. Just show me your passion. I need to see it and feel it. Make me cry.”
He pauses, picking up one of the handouts from a nearby student, and he shows us the empty page. “This,” he states, “is like a blank canvas. Tell me a story, one that intrigues me.”
Giving the paper back to the student, he takes a place at the front of the room once again. “Also, for those of you who pass this term with sufficient work, you will be eligible to install your project at the student show in my gallery downtown for display during the spring term. The final call about who has their work on display and who doesn’t will be at my discretion. Passing is not an automatic in. As many of you might already know, my gallery only does this once a year, and it’s considered to be a great privilege. Not only will many of my colleagues be there, but also buyers, sellers, and fellow artists will be present. For many students, this one show has been the springboard of their careers. In other words, if you want to make it, you’d better be in this show.”
Hums and sighs fill the room as the gravity of our work in this class begins to set in.
While I am on the art history path, which is engraved into my core, the thought of showing my work to others at a venue like Professor Turner’s gallery might be just what I need to prove to my family that there are opportunities for me outside of my father’s firm.
“That’s all for today,” the professor announces, taking a seat behind the desk and shuffling through his bag. “Use your studio time wisely. I will be here during the designated class hours to answer questions, should you have any. Also, I will need you all to email me your proposal within the next week. Really think about what you want to present to the world, your message. You know how to reach me.” He waves his hand like he’s shooing a fly. “Class dismissed.”
A few students speak quietly to one another as they’re gathering their things to leave while others line up to have a word with Professor Turner. Not giving it much thought, I collect my items, including my barely sipped coffee, and I silently head toward the door with Wolfgang by my side.
When we are outside the classroom, I playfully backhand my friend across the bicep. “Wolfie! Next to your dick? Seriously, when did you get so ballsy? And I’m not trying to be cute.”
“You liked that, didn’t you?” He grins like the conniving wolf he can be.
“I’m not so sure, but I think I’m Full of Myself Turner got a mini hard-on.”
“Probably,” he says proudly. “But another student actually gave me a tip.”
“To what? To talk about your schlong?”
“No.” He guffaws. “To just say whatever the hell you want. I guess he likes it when students lose the filter.”
“Well, there’s no doubt yours was missing.”
“Truth.”
Together, Wolfgang and I tread toward the building’s exit, making idle conversation about the holiday break, our class schedules, and the ludicrous weather because it’s uncharacteristically as cold as a witch’s bitch of a left tit today.
Bundling up to brave the outdoors, I pull my beanie over my head and slip on my gloves. Wolfgang opens the door, and the chill hits my exposed skin like tiny razor blades on coarse hair. With my arms wrapped around my middle, I accompany my friend to the end of campus where we generally part ways to head back to our respective apartments.
At the corner, waiting for the crosswalk signal to change, he asks, “So, any idea what you are going to do for your art theory project?”
“Not really. He made it sound like it needed to be epic. I don’t know if I have epic in me.”
“Sure you do. We all do.”
“Oh, yeah? What do you think you’re going to do?”
He chuckles. “I don’t know. I’m sure it will come to me when I least expect it.”
I shake my head, slightly annoyed by his ability to take so many things in stride. “You make it sound so easy.”
