KNEEL Ch 1

Here is a man.

His name is Nigel Daniel Graham, 28 years old. Commonly known as Neil. A Frenchman of an interesting ethnic cocktail, with a Korean mother and a Native Hawaiian father. Trilingual. A member of the OCBC, the Central Office for the Fight against Cultural Goods Trafficking. He works in a building located on Rue de Penthièvre in Paris. He is a policeman and at the same time not a policeman; he is an artist, yet he is not intimate with artists. What does that mean?

Instead of searching for murderers, Neil searches for thieves. His exact job title is public art detective. His daily routine consists of tracking disappeared artworks and keeping a close watch on the global art market. He collaborates with various organizations such as Interpol, the FBI, UNESCO, the Gendarmerie (French National Gendarmerie), and the Carabinieri (Italian Military Police). His favorite word to use is “kidnapping.” He does the work of returning kidnapped children to their parents. To the place where those children rightfully belong: the musée (museum).

His colleagues are sharp, possess an excellent aesthetic sense, and are, furthermore, extreme fashionistas. What aids these 21st-century art detectives is the TREIMA database on the massive central computer located in the archives. Consequently, stakeouts, pulling all-nighters, or fierce physical combat with criminals are distant stories to them. They never wear things like bomber jackets or tracksuits. Perhaps a compressed cashmere knit that doesn’t wrinkle even when sitting at a desk, but nothing else.

Neil is a talented individual who enjoys the full favor of the Judicial Police Directorate and the OCBC inspectors, but his reputation is poor when it comes to his attire. His dark brown hair is always in a state as if it has been blown hither and thither by the wind, and he buys several identical shirts to rotate through them day after day. Public art detectives travel all over the world twice a month on average, and he enjoys this business trip duty the most. This is because the office smells so strongly of cologne that it gives him a headache. Spraying niche perfumes or wearing a 500-euro belt is not Neil’s taste. His “dignity maintenance budget” is spent on collecting animal-shaped vintages from a bankrupt sticker company.

Next, Mi Hansol, 32 years old. An intellectual from the study-abroad set who skipped grades early on as a Fine Arts major at CSM1) in his late teens, completed a three-year course at IESA2), and returned to Korea. The subject of his graduation thesis was the Transcendental Philosophy of East Asian Art. Until he finished his studies, he had never left the borders of the UK and France, and he is currently active in Seoul as a curator and appraiser.

He spent a somewhat gloomy childhood under wealthy but heartless parents. He is kind when dealing with the elderly or the weak, but usually, he is a cold young man. He is especially merciless toward humans who are crazed for money and request market price appraisals, asking “How much is this?” or “How much is that?” His hobbies include being stubborn and disobeying his superiors, taking out and drinking miniature liquor whenever he has a spare moment, and mocking kitsch art as well as unskilled contemporary artists. The eras he loves are 19th-century Hungary and Austria. There are more lights and paintings in his house, which he has bought throughout his life, than there are household goods. Even if the refrigerator is dead empty, he takes out and drinks alcohol from a damn expensive cellar. In other words, he is an alcoholic who is crazy about paintings.

1 Central Saint Martins College of Arts and Design

2 French School of Art and Luxury Management

WIPE

Last winter. A woman is caught at French customs. In the wooden box she possessed, the torso—more precisely, a fragment of the torso—of the Golden Amitabha Buddha Seated Statue, one of the world’s famous Great Buddhas, was discovered.

The OCBC confirmed that the remainder of the Buddha statue, which is approximately 2m in size, is scattered throughout various places in Far East Asia. All incidents related to artworks and cultural properties occurring within French territory are under the jurisdiction of the OCBC. At the beginning of this year, young and capable art detectives decide to set out on the case. One of them is, of course, Neil Daniel Graham. The destination of the plane he boarded is Incheon International Airport. Three days before departure, he received a valuable tip from an informant. For years, there had been rampant speculation that “a part of a gilded Buddha head” would appear at a private collection auction hosted by a former President of Korea; as the event drew near, information emerged revealing this to be true. The OCBC lobbied the National Gallery Association and requested they attach a Korean appraiser fluent in both English and French.

The appraiser’s name is Mi Hansol. He is out at the airport holding a picket sign he hastily put together. It is flunkeyism. There are a mountain of things to do, yet they make him come and go just to serve some Westerner? It is flunkeyism. In his state of irritation, Mi Hansol was so full of rage that he forgot the guy’s surname. Holding a permanent marker, he decided to just scribble whatever. “If your name is Neil WHATEVER, then crawl here ASAP.”

∞ ∞ ∞

Director Kim, who holds the prickly Mi Hansol in the palm of her hand. As a great person who pushed past all the pressure Korean society exerts on talented women and went all-in on her career, she is no ordinary person, but she cherishes Mi Hansol in her own way like a child. Did this Mi Hansol leak away to somewhere again? She places a call to check. Director Kim had received help from the OCBC a few years ago during the controversy over the authenticity of Lee Jung-seob’s posthumous works. After the ringing, Mi Hansol’s blunt voice is soon heard.

“What is it.”

“What do you mean ‘What is it’ as soon as you pick up, what is it.”

“So you like informal speech. Fine, what is it, Director Kim.”

“If you keep living like that, your lifespan will only shorten.”

“Yees.”

“Did you meet him?”

“Not yet.”

“Don’t start a fight and get along well.”

“What does he look like?”

“You’ll know as soon as you see him. He stands out immediately.”

“If he’s ugly, I’m going home.”

“Ugh, I’m sick of this.”

Mi Hansol fixes the phone to one side of his shoulder and checks his wristwatch. He came here after drinking to death the day before and then sleeping to death, so his voice is thick. I’m really tired today, but I came out because of you, Director? Buy me a drink, something expensive. Director Kim tuts. Do you still have a mouth left to stick a bottle into? Mi Hansol suddenly turns his head. The gate opens. An incredibly massive man comes out. Rather than a detective, he has a face one would likely see on a UFC channel.

“Director, I think I saw him. Hanging up.”

A knit vest that is aesthetically highly discordant, a worn-out plastic bag. The fact that his nose is broken and crooked is clear even from this distance. Mi Hansol is dumbfounded. Walking around like that, of course he would stand out anywhere. The man saw the sign. He curls up the corners of his mouth. Mi Hansol also gives a smirk. Well, he’s not to the point where I’d go home.

∞ ∞ ∞

Sculpture, jewelry, antiques, canvas, craft… How wonderful would it be if one could live buried only among heavenly creations? Like other colleagues who jumped into “this field,” Mi Hansol was scraping by while having his hands in all sorts of related industries. The art management world is truly a professional group that shines as the representative of high education and low wages. One has to be the daughter of some art history professor, the son of some Art Space building owner, the cousin of some director, or at least have a lot of money at home like Mi Hansol to endure.

Whether they are appraisal directors or PR directors, those with a fair bit of prestige often own their own exhibition halls but are frequently useless at actual operation. Since Director Kim is no different, Mi Hansol’s day is naturally very busy. One moment an appraiser, another a curator, another a member of an ancient art research institute, and at another, he even has to deal with the cleanup for some detective guy who supposedly came from abroad.