SCHOFFMAN THE SHOW-OFF

My good friend David Schoffman hates to travel.

And yet, with all the professional demands that weigh upon him like bad debts he finds himself in the small soap world of hotels and airport lounges for much of his precious time. Between his lectures, exhibitions, book tours and frivolous academic research projects, David is away from his studio so much that he has delegated the production of his entire oeuvre to a 24 year-old assistant named Cindy.

In order not to completely consign his diverted attention to the slag of wasted time, when he's in a city or a town with even a modicum of cultural sophistication he finds whatever rewards are on offer and gratefully seeks them out.

For example, though he found the Ninja House in Iga Ueno terribly disappointing Imabari's famous 17th century castle with its picture postcard view of the Seto Inland Sea was well worth the indignity of signing books and posters in a strip mall bookshop in downtown Osaka.

Likewise, as on a recent trip to Urumqi to oversee the installation of his first public sculpture, the now infamous Hanny I'm Home, David found Zunghar's, the must-see avant-garde musical theater club owned by the Italian expatriate Nino Questo. It was there where he heard for the very first time that crazy and now viral take of the traditional Mandarin folk songs of Chu Chi.

Whenever he's away I can always count on receiving a postcard (David does not believe in email) where he will gently rub my sedentary face with his veiled boasts and muted embellishments.

"Dear Currado," a recent short missive began, "Monte Carlo never fails in depleting my will and sapping my soul. Just had dinner with Charles Patti and his wife (you know, the guy with the pink walls and the wierd art collection). Lovely couple but as boring as powdered milk. Wish you here though you're lucky you're not. Gros bisous, D."

Quel frimeur!!