After years of reflection, I find myself looking back at the world of art – a world that I have come to know intimately, one that I remain in, and one that has been a study of the human condition, a laboratory where art reveals the best and worst of us. In the end, we must calculate the consequences of our actions, in this life or in the life to come.
A dear friend recently passed away. Like many artists, Hilde Lynn Helphenstein there was a soul among us who felt more, who was more sensitive, who cared more for the world that she nevertheless chose and flourished within. I often wonder where we would be without people like her, those rare, sensitive souls who remind us that under pressure to cool our emotions and cultivate indifference, we still have something worth protecting. Art does that. It does it in a million ways. True art does not simply allow us to remember; it encourages us to overcome the provincial and material obsessions that this world constantly incites.
Most of the world knew Hilde as “Jerry Gogosian”, the satirist of the art world. But within her thoughts and her often hilarious delivery, lay a deep message. She was one of the few women who penetrated and held a mirror, even when the reflection was unpleasant. She followed her bliss, as Joseph Campbell so eloquently urged us all to do. What I admired most was her courage – the specific kind of courage required to be truly authentic. Authenticity is a rarity not only in the art world but in the wider world, and this should surprise no one: both contain powerful social and structural mechanisms designed to enforce conformity.
I was proud of him and told him so. She was creating work that had emotion and beauty, and that captured everything I loved about her. In April, we discussed doing a show together. She wanted to find a better handle on her voice, to interpret and reinterpret her vision on the canvas. Those conversations are something I will carry with me.
Those who know me know my habit of writing texts of, let’s say, considerable length. One friend said to another, “Georges sent me a 14-inch text last night,” to which I quickly corrected, for accuracy, that it had actually been 15. Hilde loved those texts. We laughed at how weird we both were: me writing, her reading every word. I hope they make some days more bearable. Rereading our conversations now, I feel grateful that I never stopped. Rumi wrote that most love is lost in what is said but not meant, and in what is implied but never said. Between me and Hilda, no love was ever lost.
I entered the art world with a specific vision: a gallery that was artist-centered, that had soul, that served as an anchor in an otherwise stormy sea—a place where people with a little courage could find something they’d really miss if it disappeared. Art for the journey of life. Because what I’ve discovered, and what everyone in the art world attests to, is that the greatest art is almost always made by those who are most sensitive to the daily grind of existence.
In a world that rewards the worst in us, it’s often the healthiest among us—those who truly see the beauty and purpose of life—that have it the hardest. They are, in fact, fat. They exist to remind us that the lives we are pressured to lead in order to succeed are not necessarily the ones we should lead.
Hilde felt a lot. She was unable to put aside her humanity, even when it would have served her to do so. We live in a world made crueler by the people it exalts to do just that.
I find myself returning to an old question: is it better to lose ourselves and gain the world, or to hold on to what is best in us, even as the world becomes harsh and indifferent in return… trusting, perhaps, the promises that so many religions make about what lies beyond?
Like many artists, Hilde struggled with substance abuse, as many in the art world endure. And yet she never let it harden her. She felt everything. Her art required reflection, soul, honesty and heart, and she gave it all, always.
The life Hilde led took courage, and I told her so, always. Nothing truly worth having – love, trust, compassion, empathy – can be fully experienced without it. In one of our last conversations, I told her not to get stressed or disappointed, not to feel alone or diminished. I told her that there would come a time when she would arrive in a place where no trees are stacked, where love, self-acceptance, true friendship and compassion exist unconditionally. I promised him that when he found her, he should run to her. That I would meet him there.
I know she’s there now. True to form, she beat me. And how nice it is to think that when you finally arrive, she will already be waiting.
