Tom Butler

The Artist of Death Tom Butler

Tobin Goffe is a struggling artist, until one day he receives a letter asking him to submit works for an up and coming exhibition featuring new and emerging artists. It a short space of time Tobin is the talk of Auckland Over-night, he goes from a nobody to a somebody now everybody wants him - from Amy, a hostess with a high-class strip joint - to Emma, the stunning blonde who 'discovered' him. Amy is in an abusive dead-end relationship with Troy, a no-good boyfriend. Tobin's success is placed into jeopardy when he attempts to help Amy in her bid to escape. They go back to Troy's house to gather Amy's belongings and are discovered by Troy before they are able to leave. In the ensuing fight Amy accidentally kills Troy and in the heat of the moment Tobin decides the only thing to do is take the body with them. In a desperate attempt to hide the crime, Tobin becomes the artist of death and transforms Troy's corpse into an effigy as he is entombed in a plaster cast that Tobin makes into a life-size jazz singer. But Tobin's life goes further into a tailspin when Wayne, Troy's cousin, goes looking for him. Catching up to Tobin, the artist now finds himself in a horrific situation when he is beaten and abducted by Wayne and is forced to witness a brutal rape and murder. Comfort and support comes to Tobin from and unlikely source - Helen - a transgender who stands by Tobin's side. Helen helps him pick up his shattered life by being the woman he finds he wants to love, who wants to love him back, a kind of love that he thought had escaped him from ever having. But is this the happy ending that Tobin has craved for all his life, or is there a final twist to the artist's troubled life.