Landscape: Memory

Blurb

Landscape: Memory is a 1990 novel by American author Matthew Stadler, the author's first novel. Set in San Francisco after the 1906 earthquake and in 1914-1916, the novel traces the youthful romance between American narrator Max and a Persian-British boy, Duncan.
The book is unusual in that the story is told both through prose and through 36 evolving versions of a single painting in various phases of creation and obliteration. The painting first appears as a simple landscape. Then, as the novel's central romance begins, two nude male figures are inserted in the foreground. Finally, the image is progressively blotted out with layers of black paint after the lovers are separated.