Jay Fox - THE WALLS

I take the thumbtacks out, flip the pages of my notebook to another weekend, and begin to form new constellations. The second weekend of March of this year; constellation: a distorted Auriga. The pins demarcate bars in eastern Williamsburg, Hunts Point, Washington Heights, the West Village, Carroll Gardens, and Kensington. If he followed that route, or the reverse of it, it would seem that three of the locations were necessary: Williamsburg, Washington Heights, and Kensington. Were the other three just places where he stopped to grab a beer?

I map out another eight or nine weekends and discern a similar pattern. His work always appears in at least one bar in north Brooklyn and one bar in the vicinity of Prospect Park. Morningside is frequented habitually, as is the west side of Manhattan. The east side locations are in close proximity to the various bridges that head into either Brooklyn or Queens with the exception of the Village. Either way, I believe I have found both his origin and terminus, though I don't know which is which.

I'm on the phone with Sean before I consciously realize that I've called him. “I think I know where Coprolalia lives.”

“Really?” incredulously.

“Well…not exactly; but I've come to the conclusion that he lives in Williamsburg and works around Prospect Park or works in Williamsburg and lives around Prospect Park.”

“And how did you come to this conclusion?”

“Well, first I realized that he has a car. It wouldn't make sense for him to take the train given some of the locations he hits. In Astoria alone he's been to four or five spots that are almost a mile away from the closest train station.”

“He could be taking the bus,” he says as he lights up.

“Well,” slightly deflated, “I understand that. But a car just makes so much more sense. In one night he managed to get to three bars that are each, like, ten miles away from one another. No one would go through that much trouble to paint the town, if you'll pardon the pun. A train rider would localize the bars he goes to. Someone with a car, however, would be free to satisfy his most capricious desires.”

“You don't know Coprolalia,” flatly.

“What do you mean?” fully deflated.

“Look, I've been tracking his work for nearly a decade now. You know that. Now, in the past he used to localize his work, as you said. One weekend would be dedicated to Alphabet City, the next to Carroll Gardens, the next to the Financial District and TriBeCa; then, after a few prolific weekends, he would go missing for two months or so. For the past three years, however, he's been specifying his locations, as if each bar is chosen intentionally.”

“So what you're saying is that he bought a car three years ago.”

“I guess that's a possibility,” he chuckles. “But that means that this Prospect Park-Williamsburg connection is no longer entirely sound. If he's so capricious, that means he's not tied to any pattern whatsoever; either he has a car or else he is in some capacity bound to these two locales.”

To me, it's petty nay-saying for Sean to produce such an exclusive disjunction, but, as I've learned with these professorial types, there's no point in arguing.

“So how deep into the list are you?” he asks.

“I have a few more places I need to visit.”

He grunts as to imply satisfaction. “Well, I'm going down to a tavern in Red hook later today. Coprolalia has recently been to some dumpy place by the lot IKEA recently bought for something like thirty million dollars.”

“There's going to be an IKEA in Red Hook?”

“Kinda weird, right?” he laughs.

“Going back to the piece, though — how did you find out about it?”

“Someone sent me an email.”

“This happens frequently?”

“Oh, I'd say I get at least four or five a day. Only a few of them actually lead me to genuine articles.”

“Has he done anything else recently?”

“Let's see,” as he rustles some papers, “There's supposed to be one in the courthouse in Kings.”

“Which one?”

“The one on Adams. Is that the Supreme Court?”

“I don't know.”

“I'm pretty sure it is.”

“Okay.”

“Regardless, someone told me to examine a stall on the first floor. I was going to look into that one tomorrow — the courts are obviously closed today. Besides that, as well as the one in Red Hook, it's been relatively quiet for the past month and a half or so. I suspect it will pick up in a few weeks. As I've said, he usually has a few prolific weeks, especially in the summer, followed by a lull.”

“Is it possible that he's going to neighborhoods that he hasn't been to in the past? You know, maybe that's why we haven't seen as much activity recently. For all we know, he could be working in Staten Island now.”

“It's doubtful. The only Coprolalia piece to have been featured in Staten Island — St. George, to be precise — appeared six or seven years ago.” He pauses. “And don't even suggest Jersey. I've probably seen fifteen spurious pieces in Hoboken this year alone. The only genuine article I've found over there was in the Jersey City PATH station. That was, what, maybe four years ago.”

“What about East New York or some place like that?”

“I've never been asked to authenticate a piece that deep into Brooklyn.” He pauses. “I take that back. I went out to Gerritsen Beach once. That was a nightmare.”

“Why is that?”

“It's not a bad little neighborhood; it's just not the most accessible part of Brooklyn.” He pauses. “Look, it's certainly possible that he's been out to the eastern regions of Brooklyn and Queens with a greater frequency than in the past, but I wouldn't recommend you expand into these types of areas blindly. The city has changed a lot over the years, but there are still places where one just shouldn't go. At least not alone.”

“I understand that, but it seems as though he's running low on locations. Where else does he have to go?”

“He's not a vandal out to mark his territory,” indignantly. “Many establishments have featured three or four of his pieces, sometimes concomitantly.”

“What about subway stations.”

“That's something of a rarity.”

“Well, doesn't that increase the likelihood of his owning a car?”

He sighs. “Not especially. Subway stations typically have cameras, as well as people waiting for the train. And police are occasionally there, too. In other words, he could very easily be caught if he were to take to featuring his work in train stations. This is not to say that he has never made an exception. Still, it's not a milieu with which you should waste your time.” He pauses. “I don't think he's ever done anything on — or in, for that matter — a train car. Then again, I've never looked as diligently as I could have.”

There's a long pause on the line.

“So what do you think? What should I do at this point?”

“Well, for one, I don't think it's all that wise to return to the bars that he's frequented in the past. It's not particularly conducive to finding him. The probability of catching him in the act is so low as to make the effort futile. The only reason I provided you with that list was to allow you the opportunity to familiarize yourself with some of his work.”

“I was retracing his steps with the hope of running into someone who knows him.”

A captious groan floats down the line. It's one of those things you can just feel. “It's likely that even those who know him have no idea who he really is.”

“So now I'm chasing Clark Kent?”

“I'm just saying that he is a very secretive person. He's not going to disclose his identity to just anybody.”

“And yet he was more than willing to impart that information to you,” I respond.