My duty consisted in mixing the oil paint for him. The lazy bastard, you would probably think; he just had to collect the little pâté with his brush and compose his monochrome canvas. Every working day, I had to make sure not to reproduce the same shade of pale blacks, light greys or dull whites. Before the mixture ran out, I had to make sure that each shade would be recorded in what my master named “The book of the 12000 feelings”. After all these years at his service, I got use to his rituals and his ascetic world. He eventually got used to my Hawaiian shirts.
I remember the atmosphere of the study; it felt like Leningrad (or how I imagine it) although the flat was facing the Eiffel tower. I know that he had been in exile since the early fifties. He accepted the fact that he may never go back to his Fatherland. Around the samovar, he and his wife Masha revived for each other the sepia colours of the past. He cherished her red cheeks; she was the only one he could take criticism from.

My master, Pavel Popov, was a renowned art theorist. He would sometimes show proudly the medals and honours he received from high instances of the regime. He often recalled the day he presented his theory from which he proclaimed the formula Black+White=Grey. After six hours demonstration in front of his peers, he told infatuated with his own greatness, he officially declared grey as the colour that represented at best the Sublime. According to him, grey was the precise encounter between black and white, horror and beauty, the interference of grief and happiness.

The whole content of his argument is obscure to me and he cruelly put my ignorance to the fore, as I asked for an explanation. In an effort of vulgarisation, he gave me the example of Caspar David Friedrich‘s painting “The wanderer over the sea of clouds”. For Popov, the character is standing at the subliminal point (grey) preceded by the pale grey mist (shade number 134). In his opinion, the Sublime was the very precise place where the wanderer stands: he is conscious of his position (being so close to the precipice) but also of the vertiginous attraction of the fall and death.



To me, it all seemed surreal that a man could gain so much respect for proffering such an idiotic formula. Nevertheless, his involvement in the Visual Arts met with the aspirations of the revolution. He fought the white army. Naum Gabo, Mayakovski, Eisenstein were his friends. At the time, he was a mediocre painter but he surely saw himself as the heir of Malevich with his Grey theory. His formula found an echo in the architectural avant-garde; the sublime grey slowly became a cultural norm for the exterior aspect of workers’ communal houses. Within ten years, the shade formally known as ‘Morning Mist Over the Ural” was the only paint for façade to be available in the kolkhoz basic hardware-shops from Voronezh to Vladivostok. Popov’s dedication in serving the principles of the III International, earned him a coveted seat at the ideological commission of the Supreme Soviet. Under Stalin, he would be a respected consultant for the new architectural state buildings. I imagine his daily tasks, sitting in his armchair like he does now, signing numerous administrative documents for construction permits baring the mention: use of MMOU ideologically approved by the high instances of the Party. Once in a while, he would be sent on inspection throughout the Union, assist the elaboration of the paint, make inventory of the stocks …
I suspect him to be responsible for the collective perception of his nation in the West: swathed with the greyness of mystery.
“So… the iron curtain, are you the man behind it?” I commented with the irreverence of my youth on the symbolic frontier between East and West. To my surprise, his eyes sparkled with satisfaction (he never thought of this eventuality) but shortly after, a thin moist screen blurred them.

Some who knew the colour of the gulag too well gravitated around Popov. Dissidents of the regime, members of the dislocated intelligentsia would enlighten the atmosphere of the flat with their debates, music, songs, and sorrow when mentioning the dear ones left behind. Vodka would be the social binder of those gatherings. Some infamous evening, a few singers of the Soviet army choir, on European tour that year, paid a warm visit. After singing the song of the Partisan, came the official time for toasts. I was wearing a Cossack hat and I could feel the Slavic passion boiling in my veins. Then, came my turn to speak up. With a drunken but ceremonious tune, I claimed:
“Black plus Yellow equals Green”,
I drank down in one then threw my glass over my shoulder. As I wiped my mouth with the back of my sleeve, I realised that the guests were still holding their drinks. A blizzard froze my feet on the spot as I was judged by reproving eyes.
“How dare you, young man”: said a babushka breaking the embarrassing silence. Within a second, Popov snapped his fingers:
“Masha, water colour box!”
His wife immediately complied and brought the material required for the decisive moment when the truth would unfold. It was far too late; one enters a dangerous ground when contradicting a Slave mind. As I gathered my spirit, I realised that my statement was not the most accurate I could utter on such occasion, at least not in front of this crowd. Hastily, I attended to rectify my argument:
“A dash of black mixed to generous amount of yellow would create the most delightful shade, yes… exactly, you see what I mean, moss green”.
I knew they would not get the nuance and I watched Popov mixing the colour with satisfaction. Someone looked over his shoulder and exclaimed:
“This is not green! It is khaki!!!”

I knew later that my master lost everything on one of those nights when vodka loosens the tongue of the most cautious men. It happened at the annual banquet of the Ideological Commission. All the comrades were having a passionate discussion on colour theory when Popov suddenly burst off, proclaiming that the red of the Union flag could, by no means, compete with the grandeur of the Sublime Grey. The dice were tossed. One week later, the president of the Supreme Soviet politely commanded him to make a long inventory in Siberia for an undetermined period or choose exile.




On my 30th birthday, Popov offered me a luxurious box of charcoal pens. They were made with the coal that the miner Stakhanov extracted the night he became the record holder of productivity in the Soviet Union. The luxurious set was edited in a small edition and offered to the members of the Nomenclature whose children were embracing an artistic career.
“Stick to the grey, Petruchka” he advised.
How ironic to be rewarded for my zealous dedication by the artefacts of a man whose name was turned into a word. I was officially the Stakhanovite of the grey. There I was with my trophy. Looking through the window of my bedroom flat of the Marais, I could hear the clamour of the city. They should have seen me, those who were painting the town red; they would have noticed the faded colour of my Hawaiian shirt. They were students of Nanterre or la Sorbonne joined by workers. I even saw them dismounting the cobblestones of the streets. One by one, the stones would be removed; one of the Situationist slogans promised to find the sand of Waikiki Beach under the grim layer that covered the city . Behind their barricades, the grey stone they threw in the air would batter the riot forces with Sublime blows. I embraced their causes for fear of becoming the shadow of myself.


Everyday, Popov was waiting for the mail always with the hope of seeing him.
“Could you believe it, he must know where I live!”
It became a senile obsession that Le Corbusier should pay a tribute visit to his supposed Master: Pavel Popov himself. He never was officially invited to do so, I often remarked in vain. Masha and I could only observe in silence as his soul was departing to another sphere.


One night, I dreamt that the universe was revolving around me. Mind you, I never felt myself as a self-centred person. It was more of a physical sensation. I was not conscious of my surroundings being in motion but I felt that a higher instance was turning the crank of this microcosm for which my spleen was the central axis. I felt my blood running from my head to my toe at an incredible speed. The crooked lines of a mist-shrouded landscape were uncoiling in an endless loop. Not to fall into despair, I had to focus on the memory of a human-friendly environment; the kind of place were cows peacefully eat the grass, God given animals from which the milk grants the human kind with Edelweiss flavoured cheese. I made sure I walked the line, straight in the middle of this abstract landscape, for I did not want to think about the consequences that a drift off the way would imply. To my relief, a dotted path soon opened before my dizzy step. Beams of light pierced the sky as soon as I past the first series of dots. As I walked along, I understood the relation between the chords-like dots and the celestial choreography unravelled above my head. That was it; I was trapped in a mute barrel organ or in Beethoven’s brain. From looking at the pedestrian score, I could not figure out if it was a march or a waltz performed in front of my eyes. The clouds turned into cyclones as I walked pass some coded leitmotifs. I saw the world and humanity whirled in a turmoil of silenced passions. What a rapture, my friends! It was so moving that I had curly hair growing instantly on my head (the kind of crop the wind always disrupts in a harmonious way), as a pathological reaction to the Sublime. I was dressed like Chateaubriand and I was ready to endorse my role as the new spiritual guide of our times. The crank made its last turn abruptly. It was the end of the journey. The pale grey fog number 134 that was hiding the abyss the wanderer contemplates with delight in Friedrich’s painting soon surrounded me. The score appeared again over the sea of clouds, surely a requiem this time. I knew that a step beyond would be lethal. One by one, my golden locks fell on the ground. I started crying, as I was unable to sublimate my forthcoming death. Floating over the misty Styx, a guard approached the shore on his boat. From the distance, I could see him reaching out for my hand. Frantically, I reached out for the alarm clock, my face still wet with tears.
Until late morning, I was worried whether it was a bad omen. I could be personally in danger or the score of History was going to take an unpredictable turn that day.

I was late for work. I entered the study, the lights were dimmed. Then I knew.
He was lying on his bed, his most beautiful suit on with numerous decorations and a wooden icon on his chest. Masha, the babushkas and the Cossacks were grieving in silence. The widow transferred a kopeck from her pocket to her husband’s jacket.
“For Charon”: she said and crossed herself the orthodox way. Then she came towards me, took my hand and led me to the study. She pointed at the pile of the numerous books next to the samovar. She started preparing tea:
“They are yours, now”. I sat on his armchair to contemplate my legacy. I grasped one of the books of his visual diaries, the embodiment of his daily emotions. I was expecting some striking visual answer on the state of mind of a man at the edge of his life. No bright whites or deep blacks, just greys. Maybe I was expecting a visual metaphor such as the light at the end of the tunnel like the painting by Hieronymus Bosch. Then I flicked the pages of the inventory quickly. Cows must feel the same way as I did, when they watch a train passing by ; high speed would turn the engine into a fast arrow of intermingled black and white fragments. Apparently, cows do not see colours. When the trains pass by, they can only express their joy with an exhilarating “MMOU” as the colour of the sublime is revealed in front of their eyes. I nervously giggled and I thought of a film with Humphrey Bogart. Like the Maltese Falcon, grey may be ‘the stuff dreams are made of’. I sat back, holding my cigarette like the Hollywood star. I turned the pages of the 12 000 feelings once more. No shade would match the colour of my melancholy.



Published in ARC Magazine, 2005
Hélène Martin