Two paintings hang in our sitting-room. One is by an unknown artist and shows a forest, a cloud-streaked sky, and a path stretching out into the unknown future. The other is The Chinese Girl (some people call it the Green Lady) by Vladimir Tretchikoff. It shows Lenka, the Russian painter's girl friend, who he met in a New York restaurant. The Twiverton Literary Supplement has dubbed it "the Mona Lisa of the British Working Class."
The old man enjoys sitting in his armchair, striking a Swan Vesta match, lighting up a roll-up of Old Holborne tobacco, and gazing up at The Chinese Girl. Art on prefab estates seems to send
numinous shivers down your spine and conjures up the sound of a guitar being played on a lonely hillside. In order to break out of its spell the old man will say to me: "Nip down the shop, son, and get me another ounce of Old Holborne tobacco and a box of matches."
The downcast eyes of The Chinese Girl take everything in -the laughter, the hopes, the arguments, the forebodings. You can stare at The Chinese Girl for all you are worth but she never returns your gaze. Even surprise tactics like creeping in to the room on all fours and firing off a lightening glance in her direction will not catch her off guard. One theory about The Chinese Girl is that she is brooding over the indignities that colonialism has inflicted on Asia. Another is that she feels angry about being called a Girl when anyone can see she is a grown up woman. Sometimes you feel she has some kind of inkling about what is going to happen to the residents of this prefab. The 'Que sera sera!' song on everyone's lips - the one about "the future not being ours to see" - might not apply to The Chinese Girl. A half-returned glance from her
might give the whole game away.
Prints of The Chinese Girl were mass produced from 1952 on, and the old man is pleased that he was one of the first to buy one. This would not impress every one. One day I was taking a stroll around Bath and spotted The Chinese Girl on display in the window of the art shop in Green Street. Two well-heeled characters were having an animated conversation and staring at the painting with an unusual intensity. Their talk was punctuated by hoots of laughter. "The very essence of contemporary plebeian taste!" one of them chortled.