The Collectors Apprentice

The Collector’s Apprentice by B. A. Shapiro     352 pages

I thoroughly enjoyed B. A. Shapiro’s novel “The Muralist.” The plot and characters stuck with me for a long time. If you haven’t read it, I highly recommend it. Shapiro is back with another art-centered novel, “The Collectors Apprentice.” It’s not as good as “The Muralist,” but it’s still a good read. The basis for this novel was inspired by Albert Barnes who created the collection currently housed by the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia. 

The story takes place between 1922 and 1929. In the Belgium countryside during 1922, nineteen-year-old Paulien Mertens has been banished from her home after he fiancé, George, pulled a conducted a major Ponzi scheme on her family which costs them millions in stolen art.

Paulein goes to Paris, but she is alone and broke. She must reinvent herself, and she does so by taking the name Vivienne Gregsby. She manages the connected with the art world, but her biggest fear is that someone will recognize her as Paulien. Her family had been big collectors. She and her father had planned to open a museum. Her main goal is to return her father’s art collection

Now rubbing elbows with the art-elite, Vivienne must be careful not to appear as knowledgeable as she is. One of the artists whom she becomes friends with is Henri Matisse and the two become romantically involved. One of the people she meets is an eccentric and wealthy American art collector, Edwin Bradley.

Edwin, inspired by the newly-created Vivienne, hires her to help him gobble up as much art as he can---paintings, sculptures, drawings—and take them to Philadelphia where he is building his post-Impressionist museum. In a twist of fate, Edwin now owns the seven paintings that Vivienne is desperate to retrieve.

Then George, who now goes by Benjamin, is trying to get back into Paulein/Vivienne’s life so that he can swindle Edwin.

Winding through the plot are chapters simply labeled “The Trial” and are in an all-italics font. This serves to create that dueling timeline that is plot’s structure. It took a while, but eventually I figured out that Paulein/Vivienne is on trial for Edwin’s murder!

The book went into a little too much, for my taste, about studying art, its lines, shapes, colors, etc. It also went a little too much in Matisse’s life, which I’m not sure if it is fiction or fact.

Therefore, “The Collector’s Apprentice” receives 3 out of 5 stars in Julie’s world