Lucy Steeds: The Artist

Creativity and passion under the Provençal sky

A remote, crooked house in a small Provençal hamlet. Dusty paths, azure skies, cicadas, the sun-scorched twilight of midday. It is here that the Briton Joseph arrives in the 1920s. He is to write a feature on one of the most renowned artists of his time: Édouard Tartuffe, a brilliant recluse, creator of celebrated works brimming with intensity and radiance. Paintings that celebrate life and sensuality in the wake of the horrors of the First World War. 

Tartuffe, known simply as ‘Tata’, leads a reclusive life devoted to his art. Only his niece Ettie is with him – his housekeeper, companion, muse – and, hostage to his creative greed. Joseph’s arrival disrupts this fragile order, and a momentous ‘ménage à trois’ takes its course.

‘The Artist’, nominated for the Women’s Prize for Fiction, had me spellbound from the very first page. The story of these three seekers who come together under the southern sun is as intense, visually striking and passionately shimmering as Édouard Tartuffe’s paintings. It is about creativity, dominance, creation and self-liberation. A novel about art and desire. Fantastic and extraordinary!