Almighty painter

Chapter 271 Drawing a Knife and Drawing a Miracle

The incidence of autism is about two to five per thousand.

The World Health Organization estimates that there are about 1500 million people with autism in the world, except for a few lucky ones.

The vast majority of young patients are isolated from normal society for life.

Scientists have been exploring the causes and treatments for autism for more than half a century. There are sanatoriums and research institutes around the world that treat autism.

Unfortunately, like many mental illnesses.

In today's highly developed science, the treatment plan for autism still stays in the category of empirical therapy.

Doctors can only roughly judge which treatment options are effective and which ones are ineffective based on past case experiments.

The few drugs developed have only a supportive role.

Except that the statistical method is more scientific, and you won't find priests to exorcise demons with holy water and stick a probe through the corner of your eye to churn your frontal lobe into a paste to create artificial dementia.

The treatment of mental illness in the 21st century is not fundamentally different from decades or even centuries ago.

"Some researchers actually believe that the new version of Little Prince can communicate with patients' hearts! Why does it do so?"

Sir Brown was extremely jealous.

He clearly knew how great the honor and attention would be if this conjecture was true.

It may not be a fantasy that illustrations can cure autism.

The most troublesome thing about autism is that patients often have language or social communication difficulties.

They are 30 years old and still fear the outside world like a baby, and they can only communicate with their parents and other close relatives with very simple words.

It seems that there is an invisible barrier that separates autistic babies from the perception of the outside world, and also blocks doctors from understanding them.

Even the most experienced psychiatrists need to communicate adequately with patients when designing medical cases.

And the little patients with autism don't understand what you say, so obediently fill out the "Self-Analysis Questionnaire for Mental Problems" or "Quantitative Analysis Form for ABC Behavior of Autistic Children" for you.

Pictures, a non-verbal and non-written form of expression, have become world-recognized as the best bridge for patients to communicate with the outside world.

Illustration can open doors of communication with little or no verbal interaction.

Autism intervention classrooms around the world are equipped with watercolor pens, oil pastels and fairy tale illustration books.

This has become the established rule.

Even psychologists in some related fields will learn certain professional painting knowledge.

For example, the famous Kennedy Treatment Center, this kind of superb hospital is directly equipped with an entire team of professional illustrators for artistic intervention, and the curative effect is very good.

While the Kennedy Treatment Center is known as the world's best magical place for children with autism to "take off their hats" (Note), it also brings treatment costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars per course.

(Note: Children with autism have greatly improved their behavior and can integrate into normal life. They are called hating in the patient family group.)
A few courses of treatment can easily cost millions of dollars, which is more expensive than treating cancer at private hospitals like Mayo and Anderson.

The point is a bottomless pit.

Generally, the commercial insurance for pregnant women purchased by gold-collar elite families dare not cover such expensive medical items.Except for one hundred thousandth of the richest people in the world, no one can afford such an expensive expense, so there is no possibility of universal promotion.

Psychiatrists and interventional therapy experts all over the world are looking for illustrations that can better penetrate into the hearts of all patients.

In the past, a sub-project under the WHO even contacted the magazine "Oil Painting".

With the style of oil painting, I don’t think it would be suitable for illustration.

Sir Brown also humorously suggested this kind of thing in his reply letter, and the other party can contact Disney.

just.

There are so many painters in the world, why this Detective Cat?
"Lack of artistry" is a very useful big hat, gods block and kill gods, and Buddhas block and kill Buddhas.

You draw beautifully, I can scold you for lack of artistry.

You sell expensive, I can scold you for lack of artistry.

Just because I don't like it, I can still scold you for your lack of artistry.

There are only two things in the world that are truly higher than art.

power and soul.

The soil of art is attached to power, and the essence of art serves the soul.

In ancient times, these two things were all attached to the church. Therefore, it is recorded in the literature that a small regional priest can point his nose and scold Michelangelo's sculptures for not conforming to his wishes. Mouth.

In today's society, with Sir Brown's current social status, he actually has the qualifications to despise power.

When I spoke at the European Art Annual Conference, the President of Austria and important senior officials of the European Union all stood up and applauded together.

however.

When he heard the news that a medical team believed that the paintings of Detective Cat might be able to touch the lonely hearts of autistic children in layers of closure, Sir Brown still felt uneasy.

He leaned back in the chair and took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly.

How many years has it been...

For the first time since he was in charge of the magazine, the director suddenly felt that the authority to measure the artistic value of the works did not seem to be entirely in his own hands.

There was silence in the quaint office.

The only sound left was the heavy breathing of the two men.

"This is the charm of the work that Professor Boggs is afraid of and would rather give up the opportunity to hold an exhibition than to fight against it. Sir Brown, I don't know if you are afraid. But when I read this news, I feel really scared.”

The first to speak was the Khelaife shareholder.

"I didn't mention it to anyone. The moment I saw this book "The Little Prince", I actually hesitated for a moment. Do I really want to be an enemy of such a painter? As long as what is in front of me is not an unpopular painting with a knife. , but a traditional authentic oil painting. Maybe I will also lose the courage to attack such a work of art."

Khelaife stood up, looked out the window, and said slowly: "I know that among the shareholders present at that time, I must not be the only one who had the same idea as me."

Sir Brown made a snort.

"I'm afraid it's too late to regret it now. The decision has already been made, and the end result of giving up halfway is nothing."

"No, friend, we are already on the same ship, so there is no room for regrets?"

Khelaife shook his head: "I just recalled more than once the scene when the shareholder meeting voted that day."

"That afternoon, twelve of us shareholders collectively lied. This was our first vote since we evicted Anna from her seat on the board. I'm not a very honest person, but that never bodes well. It always gets me." I can’t help but think of a famous painting scene.”

"The Death of Socrates" by Jacques-Louis David?

Sir Brown recalled what the female secretary Elliott said, and said angrily, "Even if the mob really expelled Socrates. After Socrates' death, there are still hundreds of years before the real decline of Athens. Don't worry, anyway, I guess we are watching Not until that day."

"No, no, my friend, not The Death of Socrates, but Da Vinci's The Last Supper."

Khelaife walked to the wall and looked up at the top of the shining golden medal display case, where the portrait of the old Earl Irena was originally hung.

In a sea of ​​famous paintings to choose from.

Sir Brown finally chose Leonardo da Vinci's "Last Supper" to be placed here.

This painting records the scene in the Bible story where Jesus had the last supper with 12 disciples before his disciple Judas betrayed him and was crucified.

Not a coincidence.

If one painting is used to summarize and represent the entire history of Western art.

Among the so-called three famous paintings in the world, "Mona Lisa" is actually too petty, while "Lady of the Palace" and "Night Watch" are less well-known.

On the contrary, it is the work that Leonardo da Vinci spent the most time and energy on, the replica of the religious mural "The Last Supper" in the Milan church, which has a unique historical status.

Sir Brown's choice is completely reasonable.

only--

"When I walked into the office today, I saw that you had placed this painting in your office. This made me feel even more inexplicably flustered."

"You know, I'm a person who believes in omens. Including you and Miss Irina, there were exactly thirteen voting shareholders attending the meeting."

Khelaifi stood in front of the picture frame with a big belly.

He unbuttoned the vest, pulled out a silver cross chain from the collar, and kissed it on his lips.

"You said, what role does each of us play in this changing situation? Athens continued to prosper for 100 years after the death of Socrates. And in the myths, the betrayed disciples got the [-] coins that betrayed the savior. Only three days passed between the payment of silver coins and the hanging under a tree."

“Father in heaven, forgive my sin of dishonesty, if only I were not Judas.”

The chief art consultant from the metropolis said very deeply.

beep beep...

Sir Brown's cell phone rang and he answered it.

"No matter what news you have, I'm busy now, please call again later. Postpone the agenda later." He said to the personal assistant on the phone angrily.

"Sir, I'm sorry, but Mr. Anthony called, maybe you need to call him back." The assistant said hurriedly.

"...Go on. Did he contact me for any reason? All financial matters are handled by Kruger Bank."

The chairman said it patiently.

Anthony is a well-known wealthy businessman in Rio de Janeiro. Just holding 1700 million shares in Vale Group, the world's largest iron ore producer, you can imagine how rich he is.

It belongs to the kind of rich guy who doesn't have time to pick up $100 when it falls on the ground.

As a matter of course, such rich people are very interested in both art investment and tax avoidance activities based on art funds.

Anthony is one of the wealthy businessmen with the most investment intentions in the preparatory stage of the oil painting fund, and the initial investment was more than nine figures of euros.

It was really hard for Sir Brown to refuse a call from such a person.

"Mr. Anthony saw the news this morning, and he wants to know about the illustration of "The Little Prince"..." The assistant's nervous voice came from the receiver. "Tell Anthony not to worry, I'll call myself later."

Before the secretary could finish speaking, Sir Brown pressed the phone impatiently.

He stood up hastily.

Now I don't have much free time to accompany Khelaifi to substitute any fairy tales.

The world's richest people are really no easier to serve than God.
-
The heat of some news is like a spark of static electricity in the dry leaves in autumn, which will sweep into a prairie fire at an unimaginable speed.

Originally, the debate on the topic of "The Little Prince" was already very hot, but it was only limited to the circle of art lovers and young artists.

Affected by the acquisition of Oil Painting Magazine, some financial investors are also paying attention to news in this field.

The news from "The Economic Review" directly ignited the discussion of this topic in the entire media public opinion field.

Many large newspapers, which can affect the daily lives of millions of people, have reprinted and cited this news.

The New York Times - [New Hope for Universal Art Therapy?A scientific exploration triggered by the unintentional insertion of a fairy tale book]

"The Times" - [St. Exupery's century-old legacy: Can illustrations that make little girls smile make millions of autistic families smile? 】

"Le Figaro" - [Before April 4, the International Autism Awareness Day, let us focus on a new edition of the fairy tale book that has just been released in the UK. 】

Other newspapers, such as the Berlin Daily and the Sydney Morning Herald, have more or less mentioned an anecdote about this new illustrated book.

Generally speaking, it is difficult for ordinary diseases to attract such high attention.

Autism and Alzheimer's disease are exceptions.

Fifty years ago, the disease that received the most attention was cancer, 50 years ago it was AIDS, and in the past 30 years it has turned to the neurological field.

They tend to be high in incidence and high in impact.

An average community will always have elderly people with Alzheimer's disease and children with autism.

Even cancer has targeted drugs. Mental illness often occurs around everyone, but only external intervention and treatment can be provided.

In the past, whenever a pharmaceutical company announced that a drug for Alzheimer's disease entered the third and fourth phases of clinical trials, it often attracted the full attention of the society, and the company's stock price soared.

Autism is no less afflicting to families than Alzheimer's.

And the coming April, in addition to being the Easter holiday in many European countries, April 4 is also the World Autism Day selected by the United Nations General Assembly.

Every major news media in the world will publish some special reports on the topic of "autism" at this time every year.

Television stations often also launch special programs on special topics.

King's College London's research on the illustrations of "The Little Prince" happened to attract the attention of major media.

Besides, a magical illustration with medical effects is news in itself that can arouse readers' curiosity.

a time.

Even President Osborne, who was sitting in his office on the top floor of London's Financial Street, stared like copper bells when he saw the reported sales statistics.

This is no longer a question of singing "Country road" or not.

Even if he was mentally prepared in advance, the uncle CEO was still stupid.

For a book that is not a newcomer's work and has a certain degree of popularity, its first-day sales are the highest in its sales career.

Sometimes more than 2% of all sales can be sold on the first day.

Then it will keep falling.

"The Little Prince" showed such a trend. On the fifth day of release, sales in the UK had dropped to 5000 copies per day.

The negative attitude from critics, while raising the popularity, did also dispel some people's enthusiasm for buying.

Osborne was originally very optimistic about this.

The sales figures are already much better than expected.

If the daily shipment of 3000 copies can be stabilized in April, and the dream of selling 100 million copies a year can be started happily.

But the facts told Osborne - what is happiness that comes so suddenly.

March 2023, 3, the sixth day of the sale of The Little Prince.

Perhaps because of the weekend, there has been a lot of growth in physical bookstores, and the sales data has returned to 6300.

And it's the last day of the week.

On April 4, the attention of the press began to slowly reflect on the market sales, and the sales data began to rise again, reaching 1 copies.

In the first sales week of The Little Prince, the total sales volume was fixed at 46721 copies.

This number has a chance to win the top position in the book sales list in previous years.

Unfortunately, this year we ran into "The Spare Tire", which caused a wave of gossip among melon-eating people around the world.It has been on the market for more than a hundred days and still achieved weekly sales of 75000 copies.

Fortunately, "The Little Prince" won No.3. The romance novel "Truth" that knocked Federer's autobiography from the top of the list last year exceeded [-] copies, and it was a glorious defeat for President Osborne. Ten months of malice.

If we talk about the sales of [-] copies, Osborne feels like being brushed by a slight pulse current massager, which is exciting and refreshing.

So next week's sales report card...

Uncle Osborne, who was directly shocked, rolled his eyes and passed out, about to climax!
On April [-]nd, it entered the Easter public holiday in most countries in Europe, and also entered the real "Easter promotion season".

Like Black Friday every year, the Easter sales season is also a day when major booksellers collectively ship large quantities of books.

They will issue various book vouchers and shopping discount coupons.

Physical booksellers like Saraiva, Waterstone, and Barnes & Noble sometimes implement dynamic discounts linked to the bestseller list.

The so-called dynamic discount refers to the in-store sales discount of these bookstore operators during the Easter holiday, which will be bound to the book sales ranking list in real time.

For example, for the works on the list of authoritative book statistics websites such as "New York Times", "Moon Newspaper" or Goodreads, the top 50~10 books will get a 10% discount when purchasing, and the top 3~[-] books will get a [-]% discount.

The top three will get a [-]% discount directly to stimulate sales.

This is also the main reason why Scholastic Group must list books one week in advance.

Stimulated by various promotional methods, the Matthew effect has been formed. Often, books with better sales in the past will sell more explosively during the Easter holiday.

The major media's promotion of "The Little Prince" also exerted its real effect at this moment.

Perhaps "Spare Tire" is really looking back at the book business market in the past 1000 years. It is the second book in human history after "Harry Potter" that sold more than one million copies on the first day in Europe. It is a monster player through and through.

Many data analysts have predicted that it will dominate the weekly sales list for thousands of days.

Perhaps even in the best dreams of the board of directors and executives of Scholastic Group, they never imagined that their old favorite "The Little Prince" could compete with such a bestseller.

However, such things as miracles will happen around you when you feel the most incredible.

From April [-]nd, the battle between the "little" prince and the "spare" prince has become absolutely anxious.

On Monday, "The Little Prince" sold 13571 copies.

Not only did it bounce back to the [-]-book average daily sales mark a week later, but it also set a record for the highest average daily sales volume of "The Little Prince" in the UK.

"Spare Tire" is even more ferocious.

During the Easter holiday, Netflix once again channeled traffic for the feature documentary "Harry and Meghan" that goes with the book on its own streaming client.

This documentary, which has a signing fee of hundreds of millions of dollars, has accumulated more than one billion hours of viewing time worldwide, making it the most successful documentary in Netflix history.

Under the repeated bombardment of streaming media and major TV commercials.

The sales volume of "Spare Tire" is a terrifying 28751 copies per day, ranking first among the pack.

On Tuesday, sales of "The Little Prince" continued to grow, reaching 17521 copies. "Spare Tire" sold 28329 copies.

Sales of "The Little Prince" reached 20036 copies on Wednesday.

"Spare Tire" continued to lead with 23569 volumes.

The average daily sales gap between the two sides in the UK has been narrowed to less than 3000 copies.

The new edition of "The Little Prince" has become the fifth fairy tale book in British history to sell more than [-] copies a day.

From this moment on, all book lovers understand that the sales champion of this Easter holiday will only be produced between the two books "The Little Prince" and "Spare Tire".

In fact, most people feel that there is no suspense about the sales champion.

Even though "The Little Prince" is as powerful as taking an aphrodisiac, and "The Spare Tire" has been on the market for a long time, the audience has already developed a certain aesthetic fatigue with this royal gossip.

However, in the three days of the promotion, the sales gap of "The Little Prince" was close to [-] copies.

Chasing [-] volumes in four days... Maybe, it's hard!
The only thing people are watching is whether the "Little Prince" of Scholastic Group can once again dethrone "Spare Tire" as the single-day sales champion in this battle of princes during the Easter holiday.

There are even boring bookmakers that have special odds for this.

Scholastic Group is also amazed by the achievements of "The Little Prince".

Such a strong daily sales volume is also a rare sight for a publishing house with a market capitalization of tens of billions.

The board of directors belatedly allocated another US$100 million in an emergency and began to build momentum for "The Little Prince" through various channels.

All kinds of book reviews, advertisements, and promotional messages began to bombard him frantically.

The homepages of mainstream book shopping malls have also pushed banners one after another.

The elusiveness of the market is that.

What really dropped a bombshell in the public domain was not the Scholastic Group's second million-dollar special publicity fund.

It was an explosive short video on Youtube.

(End of this chapter)