The following piece was originally written for the local publication, This Land Press, but was rejected at deadline for "missing the mark". This rejection not only came as a surprise, but very nearly disintegrated what was left of my questionable self-confidence. However, after much reflection and the absorption of several self-help pamphlets gleaned from the waiting room of a local therapist, I have decided to press on and publish the piece myself. It is my sincere hope that you enjoy the fruits of my (now) very public failure.
In a warehouse in Toulon, France, a young artist pulls an enormous canvas sheet pieced together from discarded sail material over a bronze statue in repose. The year is 1952 and Guy Montparnasse has completed his masterpiece. A golem outfitted with work boots, gloves, a safety helmet, pants and a belt with a buckle that reads, Tulsa. He takes one last look at the giant’s expressionless face before giving a hearty tug at the canvas and concealing the sculpture completely, a move borrowed from a mortician.
In the next several weeks, Le Petrolier Braves (The Brave Oilman), will occupy the lion’s share of a cargo ship headed toward the United States. Along the way there is a scheduled stop at the Port of New Orleans to unload several pallets of beignet mix and afford the crew a well deserved night on the town. Next, the statue will wind its way up the Mississippi, divert course at the Arkansas and deliver what will eventually become known as The Golden Driller to the Port of Catoosa in time for the International Petroleum Exhibition of 1953. The statue (third largest in the United States) garners much attention and slack-jawed amazement of all who attend the exhibition. But what most casual oil slobs will never appreciate is the story behind its creator.
In the spring of 1946, Guy Montparnasse had nearly deserted his dreams of becoming an artist. Subsisting on a diet of absinthe, barbiturates and literary erotica, his life was not so much spinning out of control as it was ambling in the path of a steamroller. His application to the Sorbonne had been rejected for the third time, and in their latest correspondence, the institution had expressed their doubts not only his ability to become a significant artist, but in a manner that could only be described as unusually cruel, questioned whether or not Montparnasse was “fit to be walking freely amongst the rest of the French population”. It was true that Montparnasse was given to the more violent ebbs of manic depression and ritualistic self abuse via chronic masturbation, but as his friends had pointed out, these tendencies would seem to solidify one’s acceptance to such an institution.
Broke, jobless and without much hope, Montparnasse decided to give up his artistic delusions. He took a job as a dockworker but was excused after his foreman caught him in the act of defacing the side of a shipping container. In a bipolar fit, he had painted the words le sperme de singe (monkey semen) on the broadside of a cask of champagne bound for London. His next position was that of fishmonger, a job granted to him through the father of a mutual friend. But again, Montparnasse’s maladies betrayed his employability as he was fired for what his co-workers deemed excessive time spent in the salle de bain and for hurling fish guts at passing tourists on the boardwalk adjacent to the market counter.
Humiliated and cast aside by his friends and family, Montparnasse began making plans to end his own life, but his contradictory aversion to pain and painkillers conspired to leave him among the living. One day, while thumbing through the classified section of a homoerotic magazine in a church courtyard near the Place de la Liberte, he noticed an advertisement inviting european artists study in the United States. The Art Instruction School, based in Minneapolis, Minnesota was making a push for international accreditation and as such was willing to relax its normally stringent acceptance standards, which up to that point had required the drawings of a tortoise in profile, a cartoon bear replete with top hat and bow tie, and a mildly despicable rendering of a pirate. Within a week, Montparnasse had been notified of his acceptance to the AIS based on the strength of his portfolio comprised of drawings of suicidal rodents and a series he had titled “Amputated Dreams” which seemed to be abstract expressionistic works featuring photos of the Sorbonne’s admission board members smeared in a foul-smelling, tawny source material.
Montparnasse flourished in Minneapolis. Its arctic winters and the round, nearly featureless faces of its inhabitants seemed to inspire him. Even his turbulent bouts of auto-erotic flailing were coming on less frequently now. In the United States, Montparnasse had been given freedom - freedom to call himself an artist. The school sponsored quarterly gallery exhibitions and Montparnasse was quickly becoming a star. His employment of neckerchiefs, striped sailor shirts and his european accent lent instant credibility to his work.
In a chance meeting, Montparnasse was introduced to William “Bill” Skelly, an oilman from Tulsa, Oklahoma. The two got along famously and Skelly commissioned Montparnasse to create a massive sculpture to adorn his International Petroleum Exhibition. By this time Skelly was in his dotage and had made several questionable investments including a football stadium for the University of Tulsa.
Since its initial unveiling, the Golden Driller has created its own history. In 1966, it became a permanent feature at the Tulsa Fairgrounds, its brutish right arm resting on a retired oil derrick from a depleted field in Seminole. In 1979, the Golden Driller was adopted by the Oklahoma Legislature as the state monument. And in 2006, as part of an online promotional contest, the Golden Driller was named the grand prize as a top ten "quirkiest destination" in the United States, winning its nominator a $90,000 international vacation for two. Although its once bronze coating has been stained to a mustard gold by airborne contaminates, the result of westerly breezes carrying petrochemicals from the refineries across the river, the Driller remains one of Tulsa’s most beloved icons.
The monument’s creator, however, enjoyed no such fortune. He had planned to return to the United States in 1966 for the unveiling of the Golden Driller at the fairgrounds, but his agent argued against it, claiming that his attendance “could only jeopardize his reputation as a serious artist and confuse, if not horrify the people of Oklahoma, which are a kind and Godly people.”
Mentally and physically ill, Montparnasse died on Bastille day later that same year. While cycling home after night of rampant debauchery, his scarf became entangled in the spokes of his bicycle, and as he was traveling at a decent rate of speed, proceeded to snap his neck. The coroner’s report, however, claimed that the artist had died from erotic asphyxiation. When pressed for an explanation of this additional humiliating information, the coroner noted that although the subsequent winding of the scarf had likely broken the artist’s neck, one couldn’t help but notice that the subject’s left hand was in his trousers at the time of death.
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