It was the dawn and sunrise when the traffic began to flow around, the crowd gathered, the security guards began to change shifts, and the daylight gradually changed from a deep orange to a bewitching pink, and then to a dazzling gold.

As the sun shines, Shutao is getting up from the warm and humid bathtub, she wipes off the moisture on her body, wears a Hermès silk black bathrobe, a pair of misty and bewitching eyes, slowly lights an ESSE cigarette, smokes a few puffs and snuffs it out, walks to the mirror and looks at the face projected in the mirror.

SHE'S PUTTING THE FINISHING TOUCHES ON A FRENCH BARRACAT CRYSTAL GLASS WITH SINUOUS GILT CARVINGS SWIRLING OVER IT, A PRECIOUS CUP THAT, OF COURSE, IS JUST A MOUTHWASH FOR A PEACH.

After brushing her teeth, she turned off the electric toothbrush, revealing her freshly washed white teeth, which still had some soft discomfort.

She did scrub treatment, face lift, the most important thing today is to meet the three young artists introduced to her by Lixuan, she wants others to see, she is like a person who does big things, she can't be sloppy.

It was with these golden clothes that she made these ants who thought they would one day live like her.

She often said to her rich second-generation friends: "Unhappiness is often not because society is cruel, but because you don't have the courage to be cruel to yourself." ”

Shu Tao can starve in the most exclusive restaurants in order to keep in shape, and can insist on fitness yoga and Pilates for several years, she believes that life is like exercise, there are good methods, but also hard work, otherwise it will be in vain.

After working hard, it is in vain if there is no good way.

The ideal is like a photo of a female star who has been photoshopped on the cover of a fashion magazine, one day you will be like them, but you must wait for change in your daily efforts, Rome is not built in a day, you must be good at thinking about the hardships and accumulation behind success when you see the good of others, no matter what, things that can be achieved overnight are not reliable.

She looked at the shadow in the mirror, turned around proudly, picked up the phone and dialed Liu Lixuan: "We'll see you later, oh yes, I also printed a business card, but my business card is from Dai Fan (1)!" ”

"Hahahaha, do you need to be so pompous?" Li Xuan smiled.

"I'm flashy, not pompous, okay! The flashiness is the ironclad flower, and the exaggeration is the boasting of the princess. My taste, the sun and the moon can be seen! ”

"Alright, alright. I'm going to their studio right now, which is in the SVA Cross-Border Creative Park, No. 140 Tianlin Road, Hejing Development Zone, and I'll give you the location in a moment, don't be late. ”

After speaking, Shutao was ready and went to the creative park.

Shutao drove her Maserati into the creative park, met with Lixuan, and the two came to a building.

The walls of the corridors of this building are covered with all kinds of graffiti, including the graffiti of Lina Jabbour, the imitation of Wang Guangyi's design, and the personalized patterns formed by wrapping the walls with various leaflets imitating Hong Yi's landscape art, which is dazzling but brightly colored.

A large number of students from art academies and foreign artists living in SH gather here all year round to live, work hard, fall in love, drink heavily and pursue the so-called musical dreams, artistic dreams or advertising dreams. And the three artists that Shutao wants to meet today are such young people.

When they entered the studio, there were two men, one wearing glasses, with an inch head, and a tall figure, and at first glance he was a northerner, named Tong Wei. The other man had shoulder-length hair and a thick beard on his face, but his eyes were piercing. He wears a loose Chinese top, a pair of Chinese-style bloomers, and a pair of flip-flops, revealing his vigorous toes. Even though his beard covers half of his face, he is still childish, but his exposed skin is as white as a cultivator who has not seen the light of day, his name is Xu Jia. When the two saw Shutao, they were stunned, as if they had bumped into the goddess in their dreams, and they were fascinated for a while.

Li Xuan saw the two of them frozen there and said, "Hey, you two, don't be stunned, come and say hello, this is the gallery manager Qu Shutao I told you." ”

The two introduced themselves, and they were speechless and didn't know what to say. After all, they had never seen a woman their age and dressed so well. In their eyes, when such a woman appears in fashion magazines or film and television works, although Shanghai girls are fashionable and beautiful, it is the first time to see such an extreme temptation.

Seeing that the two of them were stunned, Shu Tao handed over the business card and said, "This time I just want to hold an art exhibition for you, I trust Lixuan's vision, by the way, isn't there another one?" Where's the other artist? ”

Before Li Xuan came, he told her that there were three painters, but there were only two of them, and Shu Tao wanted to wait for someone to arrive.

"Oh, the other one is in my studio today, and we will go over for a while, mainly because this person's work is too large, and we need to go to the studio to see it in person." Lixuan explained.

Shu Tao suddenly understood and said: "Then let's do it, we'll talk about the specific operation later, show me your works first." ”

After that, Tong Wei and Xu Jia hurriedly made up their works, lined up the canvases in turn, and Shu Tao saw a few oil paintings on canvas splashed with ink and asked, "Whose work is this?" ”

Tong Wei said: "This is mine, those are his." ”

Shu Tao turned his attention to another canvas with a completely different style, showing some agile female bodies, the girls in these paintings seem to lie in the mist, half-hidden as if looking at flowers in the fog, and even the contrast between the outline lines of the body and the background cannot be distinguished, like a person immersed in water, blurred.

It seems that Xu Jia's works are more willing to express the collision of spirit and body, while Tong Wei's ink-splashed abstract paintings are more inclined to be created in an instant. One is the author's inner reaction, and the other is the product of the author's improvisation.

Shutao thought it was good, and they all liked it very much, so they said: "I think your works have their own merits, and they are all very good." Why don't we go and see another person's work now? ”

She turned to Lixuan and said, "It seems that you have a good eye, and I approve of their works." ”

Li Xuan smiled and said, "Let's go, let's go see the other one." ”

After speaking, the four of them came out of the studio to another studio, this studio is a flat floor, like a glass greenhouse renovated from an old factory, as soon as they entered the door, they saw a familiar back, standing in front of a giant oil painting with their backs to them, this person is Ma Jun! He stood there and watched carefully, not noticing that someone was coming from behind.

Shu Tao thought to himself, is this fate or a narrow road, how did he always meet him, could it be that he is also one of the painters who made an appointment this time.

She glanced at the huge oil painting, on which more than a dozen strange people were entangled with each other, some of the bodies were connected, some of the heads were big and the bodies were small, and some of the lips were bursting. The style of the painting has some of the realism of Lucian Freud (2) and the despair of Egon Schiller (3), and at the same time is full of Salvador. The imagination of Dalí (4).

Through painting, she gradually became interested in Ma Jun.

Before Shu Tao could call his name, Tong Wei called: "Hey, Ma Jun, where is Shanzi?" ”

Ma Jun turned around, his eyes immediately fell on Shu Tao, and said, "Beauty, why are you here?" ”

Lixuan asked, "Do you know each other?" ”

Shutao immediately said, "I don't know." ”

Tong Wei didn't listen to what they were saying, so he hurriedly asked, "Where is Shanzi?" Why isn't she there? ”

"Oh, that's right, Shanzi has something to do at home today, she can't come, so I'll talk about it."

When Shu Tao heard it, he realized that the painting in front of him was not Ma Jun's, and it was not Ma Jun who participated in this art exhibition, and who was this Shanzi in their mouth? It could be Ma Jun's girlfriend! Thinking of this, Shu Tao's disgust for Ma Jun spontaneously arose, and he felt that Ma Jun was a male dog in estrus, and everyone wanted to tease. She put on an attitude: "I thought that the two of us really met on a narrow road and wanted to hold an art exhibition together, but I didn't expect you to be just a soy sauce beater." ”

Xu Jia on the side saw that something was wrong, so he said: "Ma Jun's paintings are also very good, but they are not at the same level as us, last year his "Cabbage" sold for nearly 10 million yuan, but he lived in a simple and low-key manner, refusing all interviews, so the outside world knows little about him, and he is not interested in the form of group exhibitions, he only holds solo exhibitions." ”

Shu Tao smiled when he heard it: "Cabbage? Auction price? It's ridiculous. ”

Ma Jun didn't get angry, just smiled: "The value of the product depends on the time and place. It's like if you go to a public toilet to without paper, and you are trapped in the toilet, and someone happens to bring it, are you willing to spend a hundred yuan to buy handsome paper? So, don't think that if it's cabbage, you have to sell it for a cabbage price! When it comes to me, it's a heavenly dish! ”

"Nonsense." Shu Tao sat down, Tong Wei introduced Shu Tao to Ma Jun, Shu Tao looked around and said, "Then let's talk about cooperation now, there are two ways of cooperation, the first is that I spend money to buy out these paintings, and the second is that I provide exhibitions, you enter the gallery to put up paintings, and if you sell them, they will be divided according to the price, and if they can't be sold, they will be placed by it." Anyway, it's your bargain to take the risk, is it OK? ”

Tong Wei and Xu Jia didn't dare to speak when they heard this, and looked at Ma Jun, who had the most ideas in this matter and said: "You want to buy out their works, I'm afraid it's a little unbearable, and you have to get millions up and down, can you get it?" ”

When Shu Tao heard this, his heart trembled, and he said: "It's not that I don't think their paintings are worth the price, it's just that I'm a businessman, and I still care about the return on investment." ”

After Li Xuan's mind was running at high speed, he said: "Ma Jun, you see, the art market is also sluggish, and many good works are priceless, especially the works of contemporary artists. If you let the book peach buy out at this price, you will lose money and make no profit, and for the artist, it will be a hidden disaster, can you see if you can reduce the price? ”

Ma Jun shook his head and said, "It seems to be a little difficult ......"

Li Xuan added: "Since ancient times, literati and artists have been unattainable, but today's art market is different from the past, young artists need opportunities, and the gallery run by Shutao has a history of more than ten years, and the paintings on display are all from famous artists, so it can also bring popularity to new artists, which is a rare opportunity." ”

When Tong Wei heard this, he was afraid of losing the opportunity, so he rushed to say: "In this way, my paintings can be negotiable." A total of 20 works, 20,000 pairs, bought and sold at a fixed price, how about it? ”

Shu Tao glanced at Tong Wei, as if he had his pulse, and said, "It's expensive!" Up to 200,000, all gone, I'm polite enough. You don't have to pay for the exhibition arrangement, this kind of cost-effective deal, you don't need to think about it. If the single picture exceeds 10,000, there is no need to talk about it. ”

Ma Jun pointed to the huge oil painting in the distance and said, "Such a big painting is also 10,000?" This work was created by the author with a lot of effort and two years, and the potential value of this work is immeasurable! Maybe it can become the treasure of your town store. ”

"I'm measured." When Shu Tao saw Ma Jun, it was like a firecracker that had been lit, and the intellectual temperament just now was gone.

Li Xuan knew that Ma Jun was a painter whose paintings sold very well, so he said: "Otherwise, you will give your respective quotations first and send them to us, and we will talk to you again after review." If we have to give these three painters any more room to make concessions, we need Ma Jun to sell us a painting for the same price as the work of these three painters. ”

Ma Jun said: "This is not good......

"Why can't it be? You want to support your friends, right? "Lixuan came up with a counter-plan.

Xu Jia looked at Ma Jun and said, "Yes, brother, you can use your painting to raise the price for us and pull the brothers." ”

Speaking of this, Ma Jun had no reason to refute and said, "Okay, okay! But I also have one condition, Qu Shutao will accompany me to lunch alone today! ”

"You!" Shutao couldn't be more angry, and then said, "Don't you have Shanzi?" Dare to eat with me! ”

Tong Wei smiled: "Shanzi is his junior sister, Miss Qu, you think too much." ”

Hearing him say this, Shu Tao blushed for a while and explained: "I didn't think much about it, I just asked, I'm afraid that there will be any misunderstandings in the future that will delay everyone's cooperation." ”

Xu Jia said: "What I said is that Miss Qu has the style of a general, and she is in turmoil. ”

Shutao got up and said, "Eating with you, I'll talk about it when the contract is signed, I still have something to do in the afternoon, I'm sorry." ”

After speaking, she pulled Li Xuan away, angry and hateful along the way, thinking that this horse horse was not a stumbling block sent by God to block the way, so that she could encounter it. She suddenly remembered and said to Lixuan: "My dad asked me to give him a plan, but I don't have a clue to round the 2 million allocation, you are engaged in decoration, and you are familiar with this, or you can help me." ”

Li Xuan didn't refuse, nodded, and said, "That's no problem, by the way, Erman will move next week, do you want to get together at that time?" ”

"Okay, okay, I've been busy lately, and I haven't seen her for a long time."

Speaking of this, Shulei made a phone call and said, "Sister, now I have something to ask you for, can I go to your place?" ”

"Huh? What's up? ”

"Let's talk about it."

"Okay, I'll get over now." After hanging up the phone, she said to Li Xuan: "I can't eat with you, my sister has come back from the United States, and she has something urgent to find me. ”

After speaking, Shu Tao got into the car and drove away.