No Future in Art
1947
Vienna, Austria
Franz Janos Zeitbrecher adjusted his stiff, starched collar with palpable discomfort and started up the marble stairs. The echo of his steps through the floors of the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts sounded hollow and forbidding. It was a grim military march, sounded out in the solemn beat of his steps.
He paused at the old wooden door before him, swallowed, dabbed a bead of sweat from his forehead, and knocked. Painful seconds passed before an assertive voice commanded him from behind the door.
"Come in."
Young Zeitbrecher pushed open the door with some apprehension. He didn't anticipate the meeting would proceed as he had hoped. Herr Hitler was not known for his benevolence. Quite to the contrary in fact, Hitler was known for his tirades and his impatience.
"Yes, Zeitbrecher. Sit down." It was another command, not an invitation.
Franz stiffly maneuvered to the chair in front of Hitler's desk, collapsing in it as if being consumed by it. He stared across the expanse of the desk at the aging rector, waiting for him to speak. Hitler was famous at the academy and indeed throughout the continent. An accomplished artist in his own right, Hitler had settled quite comfortably into the role of rector at the Academy after a long career that had found his works celebrated across Europe.
"You are applying for admission despite an exam which was concluded with unsatisfactory evaluations by the instructors."
Franz knew this would be his only chance and that he must seize it, exploit it, if he was going to succeed in his pursuit.
"Yes, Herr Hitler. You see, the examination fails to account for the talent I have at rendering..."
"The examination fails?" Hitler interrupted. "It is you who have failed the examination."
"Yes, but the examination is not adequate to..."
"You have heard of my success here, yes?"
Franz had heard. Everyone had heard. Hitler took every opportunity to regale any student or colleague or gallery patron who had otherwise not heard the story with the details of his success. Franz had even read Hitler's self-indulgent biography, Meine Kunst, My Art.
Franz nodded. "Yes, Herr Hitler."
He had falsely assumed that answering in the affirmative would in turn spare him the necessity of hearing the story again. Hitler could not resist the opportunity however.
"I came to Vienna when I was eighteen. I was poor, but determined. I gained experience painting watercolors for the tourists. But I knew I was destined to become famous for my art, so I applied to the Academy. This very institution rejected me. They told me to take up architecture instead! I assured them that I could surpass their expectations if I was only given a chance. In a meeting quite like this, in this office in fact, the rector gave me that chance. I proved to him that I deserved it. Before the war, I had become the most famous artist in Vienna. After serving in France, I became famous throughout Europe. The rector wrote me after that, begging for me to come and teach at the institution which had once rejected me. And now I am the rector and no one doubts that I have conquered all of Europe with my art."
By this point, Hitler was becoming quite passionate. You might think he was orating to a crowd of thousands at a political rally rather than a single would-be art student in a lonely office.
"So you have heard of my success here. Perhaps you were falsely inspired by that tale. Perhaps you thought that anyone who fails the examination may simply appeal and that I would accept your submission out of some sense of nostalgia or pity. If you thought that, then you were mistaken."
Franz opened his mouth to reply, but Hitler slammed his fist down upon the desk. "You know nothing of art."
He held up pieces of paper which Zeitbrecher recognized as examples of his own work.
"Your work is amateurish, puerile even. It lacks skill and consideration. You have no appreciation of the human form. You have no future in art! Perhaps you should look into architecture."
"Excuse me, young man."
Franz looked up at the old man standing before him. His head was crowned with wispy white hair and his chin coated with a thick beard of the same color. His hands were those of a laborer, perhaps a clockmaker or a craftsman. He wasn't dressed in the fashion of a Vienna worker however. The cut of his suit struck Franz as...out of place.
"May I join you?"
The old man sat down before Franz could say no. Franz was too depressed to care, however, and simply resumed nursing his beer.
"It's a good reason to drown yourself in beer, no doubt," the old man stated, taking a sip from his own.
Franz looked up again. "What's a good reason...?"
"The Academy. Rejection isn't easy to take."
"What do you know about it," Franz asked.
"Oh, they rejected me, thirty years ago! I thought it was the worst day of my life. I wanted to kill myself."
Franz's mood darkened at the mention of suicide. He had been thinking of ways to die before the old man sat down.
"You shouldn't let angry old Hitler make you feel worthless. He's just a bitter old man who can't hold a brush anymore so he takes it out on the students. If you ask me, his art was never impressive in the first place."
"How do you know Herr Hitler?"
"He was the one who rejected me."
"Hitler wasn't the rector thirty years ago. Your memory is bad, old man."
"My memory is old, but I remember today quite clearly."
Franz looked over the old man again and dismissed him in the same moment.
"You're strange," Franz declared before taking the last gulp of his beer.
"You will be strange one day too, Franz, when you're an old man like me." The old man laughed.
"How do you know my name?"
"I am you, Franz."
Franz furrowed his brow and wondered how many beers the man had drunk already.
"I assure you," the old man continued, "that you will believe me in time."
"Believe what?" Franz asked, annoyed.
"Believe me when I tell you that we are the same person, you and I. I am you, an older you. I am what you will become." The old man smiled.
Franz pushed the man away from him and started to leave.
"You'll not be getting any money from me, you old drunk!"
"I assure you, I do not seek money. I have money to give you if you will listen."
Franz turned around to see the man holding Marks in his hand - money that could buy Franz food and more drink and perhaps a bed to sleep on. What could it hurt to humor an old man if it earned him dinner? Perhaps if he could get the man even more drunk, he could acquire more money from him...
The old man smiled. "You are wondering if you can get more money from me, Franz, aren't you?"
Franz scowled at the man. "Suspicious bastard, aren't you?"
"I don't have to suspect. I know you Franz, just like I know myself. Perhaps even better than I know myself. Now come, let us get some food. That is what you want, isn't it?" The old man motioned with his hand, urging Franz to join him.
After the old man ordered some food, he told Franz things that he already knew. He told Franz about his own childhood. He told Franz about the girl he liked at school, the one to whom he had never spoken but stared at endlessly from a distance. He told Franz about the bully Albert Schiller who beat him up every day for a year. He told Franz about the scar on his elbow from when he cut it open climbing over a stone wall when he was 9 years old. The old man rolled up his sleeve and showed Franz a similar scar in the exact place where Franz's scar was, only this scar was older, more wrinkled.
After speaking at length to Franz about himself, the old man finally came to his point.
"The reason I came here was to tell you not to be bitter. Do not hate Hitler for what he did."
"Hitler destroyed my life. He deserves to die. No, he deserves worse than death. He deserves to have his dreams crushed, just as he crushed mine!" Franz responded, brooding.
"No, do not give into that emotion. I know you want to be an artist, but this is not the way. When I was your age, I spent years being bitter over this rejection. I brooded in the corners of bier halls and punished myself by failing at everything I did, all because I couldn't be the artist I wanted to be. But I'm here to tell you that you get to do something greater than be an artist. You are going to participate in the greatest scientific discovery in history! I work in America on a special project funded by the United States Government. In twenty five years, they will recruit the most brilliant minds in the world to work on this project. They will build upon the theories of Albert Einstein and this project will lead to the invention of a device that exploits the relative nature of time and space. This device allows for a person to travel back and forth in time, as easily as you might board a train. That is how I arrived here. And this device will be created with your help. You will be the head engineer of this project."
Franz settled on his earlier assumption that the old man was crazy and drunk. He spoke in mad fancy about science as if it were magic. The fact that he'd aimed much of this fantasy at Franz was strange, but maybe the old man just needed an invested audience. The only thing the old man had going for him were the Marks in his billfold.
"You don't believe me yet, Franz," the old man started, "but you will. I will prove it to you."
The old man reached into his jacket and retrieved a pocket watch on a chain. It looked like a pocket watch at least. It had more than twelve hours printed on the face, but Franz couldn't see that they were in fact years, rather than hours.
"With a simple turn of these dials, I can take us into the future or into the past. I can show you the world of my time and all the wonders that will be. Or maybe you would like to see your mother again. Return to your youth and beat up little Bertie Schiller for picking on you just because he was bigger."
Franz was losing his patience. Despite the dinner and the potential for money, this old man was getting tedious. Franz imagined beating him in the alley behind the bier hall. How did Franz know the old man wasn't intending to kill him? This could be a big trick just to get Franz to go somewhere with him, away from the crowds. And maybe Franz would turn it around on him, beat the old man at his own game.
Before Franz could imagine more scenarios of beating the old man, he noticed the old man grabbing his arm and twisting one of the dials on the watch.
1912
Pressbaum, Austria
Franz collapsed on the ground, coughing, spitting up blood. He felt hands on him, pulling him to his feet, but he couldn't stand on his own yet. He realized it was the old man helping him up. Franz pulled away, collapsed again to the street.
"It feels that way the first time. The bleeding stops on its own. You'll be fine."
The old man bent down to Franz, helping him sit up on the curb. He handed Franz a flask and removed the cap for him.
"Take a swig. It helps a lot."
Despite his better judgment to accept anything more from the old man, Franz took a swig and swallowed the foul taste down.
As his senses came back to him, Franz realized that they weren't in the bier hall anymore. He glanced around to find a familiar sight. He was sitting in the street outside his childhood home. He hadn't come back here since his mother had died. It looked exactly the way he remembered it. But he had sworn that he would never return, and here he was.
Before he could think to leave, Franz watched the door to his old house open and a young woman stepped out. It was his mother. Only it wasn't, because she had been dead for six years and this woman was younger than his mother had been. But it was his mother. There was no mistaking her brown hair and brown eyes.
"You are five years old, Franz," the old man said. "You're probably going to get beaten up by Bertie Schiller today."
Franz watched as a young boy followed his mother out of the house. It was Franz, exactly as he could remember himself, though it was odd to see himself this way.
"How are you doing this?!?" Franz demanded.
"It is as I said," the older Franz replied as he held up the pocket watch. "Travelling through time."
"Why did you come back to me? You could have gone anywhere."
"I came back because the day I was rejected by Hitler was the worst day of my life. I needed you to know that we will be okay. Even better than okay!" The older Franz laughed.
"Take me back!" Franz demanded. "Take me back to my time!"
"Okay, okay." The older Franz held Franz's arm and turned the dial back.
1947
Vienna, Austria
The second time experiencing such travel was no less disturbing for Franz. He found himself on the ground outside the familiar bier hall. He deposited what amount of beer he had drunk earlier on the ground beside him and waited for the wave of nausea to pass. As his mind cleared, he thought of what he'd seen: his mother, alive. He could go back and see her again. Give her money to see doctors. He could make sure he didn't lose her this time around.
But another thought pressed on his mind with greater passion. He could get his revenge on Hitler. Franz could kill him as a boy, or maybe just cripple him. No, he deserved worse. He deserved to feel what Franz had felt - every painful moment of rejection. Franz could always go back and save his mother. Hitler's fate could not be delayed...
As the older Franz helped him up, the younger Franz seized his opportunity. He pushed his older self against the wall of the bier hall, slamming his head back into the brick. The older Franz hadn't seen it coming and couldn't react in time to prevent it. Franz noticed a dark stain on the wall as the older Franz slumped to the ground. He dug through the old man's pockets until he found the device. Just as he pulled it loose, Franz heard a man yelling nearby.
"What have you done, boy?!?" the man screamed at Franz. "Murder!"
Franz could barely hear the man over his own heartbeat in his ears. With the pocket watch in hand, he ran down the street. In addition to his own footsteps, he could hear several more behind him.
"Stop!" they called.
But Franz couldn't stop. The old man didn't matter anymore. He represented a future Franz would never see. Franz fled down an alley and hid as he heard the footsteps run past. In the dim light, Franz examined the face of the device and deciphered its controls. It had preset locations indicated by some numeric values. Some of the locations had hand-scribbled labels such as "Los Angeles" and "Vienna." The date could be adjusted by spinning several knobs to select year and month and day.
Franz selected "Vienna" and a date farther back in time, far enough for him to set his plan in motion.
"There he is!" a voice screamed from the entrance to the alley. As the men rushed towards Franz, he pressed the button at the top of the device and closed his eyes.
1907
Vienna, Austria
Adolf Hitler knocked on the old wooden door with the confidence of man who knew what he wanted and how he was going to achieve it. He was going to convince the rector that he belonged here at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts. It was his destiny to be a great artist.
"Come in."
Young Hitler pushed open the door with enthusiasm and stepped into the office. He anticipated that the meeting would be short. It would not take long for the rector to concede to his request for admission. After all, Hitler was a passionate and convincing speaker.
"Yes, Hitler. Sit down." Adolf didn't notice the abruptness of the invitation.
As Adolf took a seat, the rector immediately spoke.
"You are applying for admission despite an exam which was concluded with unsatisfactory evaluations by the instructors."
"Yes, Herr Zeitbrecher. You see..."
The rector interrupted, "Yes, yes, I see. I see that you are not easily dissuaded from your goal. Is that right, Herr Hitler?"
"Yes, I am very eager to attend..."
"Yes, I am certain you are. And you thought that a failed examination should not deter you from gaining admission?"
"I am a good artist, Herr Zeitbrecher. If I could only show you..." Hitler fumbled with some drawings in his hands.
"That won't be necessary, Hitler," the aging rector stopped him. "I have already seen your skill. You are quite accomplished..."
"Thank you, Herr Zeitbrecher," Hitler gleamed, knowing this was his moment.
"I was not finished. You are quite accomplished at drawing these buildings and landscapes," the rector continued, pointing at examples of Hitler's work on his desk. "But your renderings lack a talent for artistic painting. You have no appreciation of the human form. These portraits lack skill and consideration."
Hitler opened his mouth to protest but the rector held up a hand.
"I'm afraid, Hitler, that you have no future in art," the rector smiled as he spoke. "Perhaps you should look into architecture..."
1939
Vienna, Austria
Franz Janos Zeitbrecher opened the door in response to the forcible beat against it only a few moments before. He had known this day would come eventually. It had been inevitable. Franz had lived a good seventy years, though by state records he was only born ten years ago.
"Franz Zeitbrecher, by order of der Führer, you are under arrest," the blonde-haired, blue-eyed officer spit out with no concern for civility.
Franz smiled. "Did he tell you why I am under arrest?"
The officer's gloved hand met Franz's cheek with the precision of Schutzstaffel training.
"You are a Jew and as such you have no rights, Herr Zeitbrecher. You will come with us."
The soldiers rushed in and grabbed him by the arms, pulling him out into the street. As the secret police took him away to what he knew would be his end, Franz Zeitbrecher slipped his hand into his coat pocket and rubbed his fingers over the face of a broken pocket watch. It had stopped working long before the Nuremberg Laws and Kristallnacht. The events he had set in place years ago could not be undone now. One thought consoled him, however: at least he had been a great artist in his time, something Herr Hitler would never be.
The End
1/4/2010