The Versatile Master Artist-Chapter 70 - 62: Anna’s Fury

The last painting facing away from the audience was directly flipped over by Anna at this moment.

"Jean Arnou, right?"

This time she didn’t even have the intention of asking Thomas who the author of the piece was, and spoke with a very certain tone.

"Of course, in the illustration world, besides this renowned elder artist, who else’s work could be worth a million dollars?"

Anna stared at the illustration in the frame.

Unlike when she mercilessly criticized Van Doorn, Anna became gentle when describing this elder artist whose life experiences can be considered legendary.

"Mr. Jean Arnou is honored in the art world as the ’Warm Christmas Tree,’ his works have warmed generations of children."

"Regarding this painting, there is nothing left for art critics to evaluate. Everything the painter wants to convey has been spoken through the painting."

The last work presented to people turned out to be a crayon drawing.

If colored pencils are impressions of rookie doodles for elementary students, then crayon drawings are kindergarten toys.

But what this drawing presents is not childish.

It is childlike.

Warmth—this is the theme of the painting.

The entire Batman series, besides financial power, follows a dark and gloomy adult black fairy tale art style.

Just like the literal translation of Gotham City, it’s a city of fools and a city of sin.

This crayon drawing, however, is completely different in style,

The strokes are gentle and delicate, the horizon in the background has a sunrise fixed over the sea, looking both like the sun at dusk and the light just before dawn.

Though the sky is neither ominous nor bright, the tone of the entire illustration is not at all eerie.

A brilliant halo drives away the darkness, illuminating this city is Batman, or rather, Mr. Hibernian wearing a bat cloak.

Jean Arnou cleverly replaced the garish Franklin banknotes originally wielded in Thomas’s photo with burning flames.

Leaving only a half-burned bill in the corner of the scene.

The flames in Batman’s hand are tinted with warm colors crayon, emanating warm and dreamy gloss, evoking memories of years past, of the hopeful match burning in the hands of Andersen’s little match girl.

Someone commented in the comment section.

"I may not understand art, but looking at this painting makes my heart feel warm."

"Compared to the colored pencil drawing that looks like a photo before, which one do you prefer?"

"They’re about the same, but if I were Mr. Hibernian, I would definitely prefer this painting. Its concept and purpose are truly remarkable."

"For illustrations, this painting is perfect hope—" Anna glanced at Thomas beside her.

"Of course, besides donating one million dollars to Mr. Jean Arnou’s children’s fund, I will also contribute an additional ten million dollars to establish my own children’s charity fund."

Before Anna could finish speaking, Thomas interjected directly.

He really loves this illustration.

The moment he received the picture, not only did Thomas love it, he was immensely surprised.

Art isn’t the critical issue.

Mainly, this picture is too fitting for his program.

After achieving fame, many people have derided him as someone who rose to wealth by blindly throwing money to catch attention—this is indeed the truth.

Now, the mere composition and meaning of this painting perfectly epitomizes the value of his video’s content.

Not only does it cleverly align with the Batman theme, it also excellently matches Thomas’s channel’s motto "Share the interesting world with everyone."

At least for Thomas himself, spending a few million dollars to buy such a painting is far more meaningful and worthwhile than spending tens of millions buying works from Gauguin, Monet, Van Gogh, or Picasso.

He’s planning, after some time, to set this illustration as his profile avatar on YouTube and Twitter.

The comment section exploded again.

Mr. Hibernian is always known for his lavish giving, but deciding to donate ten million dollars upon seeing a painting for the first time.

"Astonishing, this is the allure of a great artist."

"Mr. Hibernian is amazing!"

"Keep it up!!! I’m rooting for you."

"This beats those silly [beep—] streaming gambling ads with spinach on Twitch (Europe and America’s largest gaming live streaming platform) in front of millions of fans."

...

"I suppose this is what the old artist expects of you."

Anna stared at this crayon drawing for a few seconds.

"The value of an illustration lies in its background story, even though you’re not Roosevelt, if you keep going. I guess one day this painting might really be worth a market value of one million dollars."

"Miss Elina, how would you rate the three paintings individually? I think the audience is eagerly waiting for your evaluation."

Thomas asked.

"Seven points, ten points."

"The first colored pencil drawing, although compared to the second work, has obvious muscle deformation and pen errors, it’s still a good enough illustration. I give it seven points.

As for Jean Arnou’s work, whether in idea or composition, I can hardly imagine a crayon drawing better than this one, which can almost be said to be perfect, so I give it ten points."

Anna’s fingers gently tapped on both the first colored pencil drawing and Jean Arnou’s crayon drawing.

"As for this work..."

She gazed long at the painting.

"Would you give it another full score of 10?"

Thomas inquired.

For some reason, he could sense that Anna had always shown a special fondness for the illustration she held.

Yet, at the moment of rating, just like when she was appreciating the artwork earlier, the other party seemed to fall into a mysterious displeasure in the end?

"No... I can clearly say, I love this work, but the painter doesn’t deserve my full score." She laughed coldly.

"Why?"

Many viewers watching the video recalled that scene—

The expression revealed when the other party examined the painting with a magnifying glass, a look caught between watching an errant boyfriend or an unreasonable madman.

And this critic lady’s final comment—"Hopeless fool."

This left everyone confused about whether she liked or disliked this illustration.

But during the recording process, wasn’t the judge in the wheelchair always expressing appreciation and praise?

"Firstly, I deduct points on emotion. Aside from being meticulous, I don’t see any other emotions in this painting. However, for illustrations, emotions aren’t key. People are used to calling illustrators drivers who take passengers to their destinations, drivers don’t need much extra emotion."

Anna placed the colored pencil illustration she always held back onto the table.

"Actually, compared to the other five works, the emotions in this painting aren’t bad. Even plain and honest meticulousness is better than Mr. Van Doorn’s work, which obviously shows no emotion but pretends to be a madman’s gibberish."

"Its emotional deficiency is only in comparison to Jean Arnou’s crayon illustration that brings warmth at first glance."

Anna’s tone suddenly turned colder: "What truly makes me unable to accept, difficult to understand, intolerable is this painter’s handling of the painting."

"This painter shows master-level skills in all the most challenging details, yet in things any other person could easily do well, he drives me crazy."

"To present the best effect, water-soluble colored pencil drawings usually use special fine-textured watercolor paper, even cheaper ordinary watercolor paper isn’t unacceptable."

Anna pointed to another colored pencil drawing. "For example, this painting is drawn on very professional water-soluble colored pencil paper, this is professional."

"Ordinary watercolor paper isn’t expensive, even the best thick watercolor cotton paper from England costs only about 80 euros for a pack of ten sheets. On average, each sheet isn’t more expensive than a hamburger."

"And this painter? Used the most ordinary student sketch paper. Damn, why didn’t he just draw cheaply on printing paper?"

"Sketch paper, unlike ordinary printing paper, does have some hanging lead capability, but its paper texture is very poor. Other than being cheap, it’s not suitable for professional colored pencil drawing. The painter did excellently, but this didn’t prevent many white noise points that could have been avoided in the final picture quality."

Anna’s fingers pinched each other closely.

Having artistic OCD, she looked at this drawing paper like viewing a peerless beauty artificially marked with moles.

"What kind of irresponsible fool of a painter, after completing this masterpiece of an artwork, treats it like an old shoe?

I didn’t see him take any protective measures for this painting, not only did he not cover it with protection, he didn’t even spray the basic fixative, and it was just mailed away."

"Just like this—bare, starkly, placed in an envelope by the painter and carelessly mailed away!!! When examining it with a magnifying glass, I found at least five spots damaged by pencil friction during transport."

"What kind of irresponsible fool is he?"

The more Anna spoke, the angrier she became; she could not tolerate this blasphemy against art, this Miss Iceberg almost turned into a volcano.

She even bit her silver tooth while speaking the last words.

"Nine points, don’t blame me, this is entirely that fool’s own doing."