‘But the art part of the international art market is done by yours truly and other people like me – your actual artist,’ he said. ‘And for us it’s all about the expression of the—’ He faltered, waved his hand, and gave up. ‘The expression of the inexpressible. There’s no point asking what a piece of work means, you know? If we could express it in words do you think we would have spent all that time bisecting a cow or pickling a shark? Do you think bisecting a cow is somebody’s idea of a fun fecking afternoon? And then to have stupid people come up to you and say “It’s very interesting, but is it art?” Yes, it’s fecking art. Do you think I’m planning to eat the fecking thing?’

He sipped his tea and frowned. ‘God, I wish I’d asked for some vodka. Is there any chance of a vodka?’

I shook my head.

‘Did you ever bisect a cow?’ I asked.

‘Only on a dinner plate,’ said Ryan. ‘I don’t mind getting my hands dirty but I draw the line at faeces and dead animals. The hands are important, feeling the medium you’re working with. Did you take art at school?’

‘Drama,’ I said.

‘But you must have played with Plasticine – right?’

‘When I was a kid,’ I said.

‘Do you remember the feeling as it squeezed through your fingers?’ he asked, but he didn’t wait for an answer. ‘And you must have worked with clay at least once in your life.’

I told him I had and that I remembered the slick texture of the clay beneath my fingers and the excitement I felt when it went into the kiln for firing. I didn’t mention that nothing I made ever seemed to survive the firing process, usually exploding and often taking other people’s work with it. After a while the art teacher, Mr Straploss, just refused to let me do pottery. It was one of the reasons I took drama instead.

Ryan claimed that it’s the relationship between the artist and his materials which drove the art. ‘It may look like just a collection of random junk to you,’ he said. ‘But there’s always something. When I was about sixteen, I suddenly understood that I wanted to find the meaning in those juxtapositions, to push the way I saw the world out through the aperture of what little talent I had. Can you understand that?’

‘Yeah, definitely,’ I said, and before I could stop myself. ‘I wanted to be an architect.’

Ryan’s mouth actually dropped open. ‘An architect?’ he asked. ‘What happened?’

‘I was taking the right A-levels but I was told that my draughtsmanship wasn’t good enough,’ I said.

‘I thought it was all done on computers these days,’ said Ryan.