entitled - gene gallagher

PART VI

19th October 2020

"Oh, Rosa- Rosaline!"

Rosaline Albarn whipped around, taking a few steps to the right to stop whoever was trying to get out of the classroom door from getting blocked, "Hmm?"

Jakob Walker was a freshly graduated UAL student, currently going through his freelancing career as a fine artist, whilst on the side teaching first year students at his previous University. He was extremely talented in his field, which is exactly why the arts school was so excited to keep him around even after he graduated, and being so young, he seemed to connect with fresh students in an easier way than somebody in their thirties would.

"Not to pry..." He says, walking over to her, "But has there been something bothering you recently? I looked through your portfolio, it's brilliant. But this recent unit you've been slacking, and I can tell."

She rolled her eyes dismissively, letting out a sigh, "I don't think you're supposed to tell your students their work is shit."

He deadpanned towards her, "I'm not saying it's shit, it's not. I'm just saying you can do better."

Her expression didn't change, and she still seemed disinterested in the topic.

"You're not here because of your parents, Rosa," He added on, "You're here because you're talented. Stop half-hearting your work."

"I'm not half-hearting- I just have no inspiration at this point in time," She responded exasperatedly, "My best work was things to do with isolation and detachment. I don't feel like that right now, therefore, no work."

"Being able to channel more than one emotion into your work is an extremely useful skill to have. Surely not feeling isolated and detached anymore is a good thing? Use that. What helped you not feel like that?"

Rosaline just sighed.

"Sit down," He added, pointing to one of the chairs, "Come on. Let's have a talk."

"No, I get it. Use my emotions in my work. I'm not an idiot," She hissed, possibly a little too hatred-filled.

"I never said you were," He leaned back in the chair, "I would just rather get to the bottom of this now and then I don't have to deal with it later."

"I'm not into being therapised."

"You have quite the hot-head, don't you, Rosaline?" He smirked.

She gave a sharp glare in his direction, but sat down nevertheless, "What did you want to know?"

"I don't want to know anything," He says flatly, "How you feel is your own business."

She raised an eyebrow.

"I'm just giving you a goal- for this unit, I want you to pick a subject you've never used before, and roll with it. I did the same thing in my final year when I had an artist block."

"Explain deeper."

He nodded his head, breathing out a little, "For example, I always based my art around my love for film. A lot of my work was presented in stop motion animations or timelapses, as well as doing a brief where I was able to redesign popular movie posters but in my own art style."

There was a quiet pause for a second, probably for effect.

"So, when I had an artist block, I decided to choose something I've never really been interested in before. In school, I absolutely hated Biology class, so I did a unit on the human brain and how it works. Emotions, thoughts, feelings, memories, etcetera... you get where I'm going with this?"