Arte – 04 [Courtesan]

Welcome to another week of ‘Arte learns life-lessons while painting as a side business’. This week, we are reunited with the lovely Courtesan-san from back in episode 2, with whom Arte forms an unlikely friendship. Let’s break it all down.

Last week, we saw Arte developing feelings of romantic affection towards a man for the first time in her life, which made her feel a kind of pain she had been unfamiliar to all her life. She couldn’t understand her own emotions and this week too, she seems to be having a hard time dealing with them. Whenever Leo-san is anywhere near her or their bodies so much as brush up against each other, Arte finds herself stiffening up and overcome with an inability to process anything around her. Though, she still cherishes the moments when Leo-san appreciates her efforts in any way. She learns about a new method to improve the quality of the bread from the local baker and when Leo-san compliments her in his usual droll manner, it brings her real happiness, making her feel like the efforts she put in were worth it.

Leo-san later asks Arte to accompany him to go meet a client who wants to get her portrait done. He tells him that she is the same Courtesan they met a few days back. They reach the place she lives and Arte is surprised by how immense it is. She wonders whether the Courtesan comes from a rich family but Leo-san tells her that actually, the place is rented by the money she makes through her trade. To top it all, she also provides for her family through her income as well.

They are welcomed into the mansion by their host who introduces herself as Victoria and Arte greets her with a chivalrous princely bow. Victoria tells Leo-san that her client is into women who are knowledgeable and well-read so, she’d rather have her portrait in her library while holding a book. It bears note that back in those days, prostitution was pretty much an open business but it was still gravely frowned upon. The women who made themselves available for such services were derided by both men and women alike. And growing up in such a time, Arte herself had a fixed notion of what prostitutes were like. So, seeing the way Victoria carried herself and the manner in which she lived, surrounded by books, comes as a surprise to Arte.

Leo-san assigns the job of painting Victoria’s portrait solely to Arte and she happily agrees. In the coming days, she goes about her job diligently while getting more comfortable around Victoria. When one day Victoria asks Arte if there was something that bothered her, she tells her that about the manner in which Leo-san’s presence has been unsettling her of late. Victoria understands that what Arte has been feeling is essentially love but she also realizes how dangerous harboring such feelings can be, for a woman who doesn’t want to rely on men for support and make a living for herself. She takes Arte along with her to the dark alleys of Florence where they see a worn-down prostitute being treated in ways that Arte has come to expect from the profession. Victoria tells her that that woman too was another high-class Courtesan like her but she became this way because she fell in love with a man.

And that’s the philosophy Victoria lives by. That a woman who chooses to forge her own path in the world cannot have anything like a man’s love. That she will always have to make a choice: between her love and her work. She believes that the two cannot co-exist. It’s a notion Arte doesn’t completely believe in but for the time being, she realizes that she needs to focus on her craft more than anything else and that she cannot let her newfound feelings distract her like this.

And thus, with greater resolve, Arte decides to not run away from what she’s feeling but instead to try and focus on what’s of immediate importance: her dream of becoming a painter.

What else awaits her on this journey? Join me next week to find out!