Fasterpiece by Ian Creasey (Asimov’s Science Fiction, January-February 2022) opens with the wife of an artist watching him at work:
As Elaine harvested plums, carrying them from the garden to the kitchen, she glanced through the large windows of Barnaby’s studio. She could barely see her husband: only a blur as he moved with superhuman rapidity, augmented by the Alipes system. He flitted between three separate canvases, executing portraits simultaneously in watercolors, oils, and pastels. Today’s client sat at the far end of the studio, her stillness emphasized by the contrast with Barnaby’s whirlwind. Elaine disliked these Alipes-assisted commissions, but many customers appreciated the shorter modeling time. p. 124
It turns out that the husband, Barnaby, has some sort of time-acceleration device fitted (similar in effect, I guess, to Gully Foyle’s commando wiring in The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester).
His wife is not happy, however, for two reasons, (a) he isn’t using the time saved to spend more time with her and (b) she fears that, with so many using the Alipes system, the market will be saturated with artwork. After discussing the latter problem with Barnaby (she is his agent), he decides to head off to the Birmingham Wipe (the site of a nanotech accident that has turned a large swathe of terrain into glass) to see if an artists’ collective he knows of can produce something special—and saleable—before the art bubble bursts. After he leaves Elaine goes to see her sister, who is living as a refugee in a half-drowned London.
So far, so good: there is a novel SF gimmick, interesting characters, and an intriguing background. Unfortunately, however, the rest of the story sees Elaine head up to Birmingham to find her husband (Barnaby is spending too much subjective time away from her), at which point (spoiler) all the Alipes time-acceleration stuff is jettisoned and the story devolves into a bland fantasy adventure in a virtual reality populated with charismatic queens, dragons, etc. (and this latter part is not much improved by worthy discussions about art or mentions of Picasso’s Guernica). Very much a game of two halves.
** (Average). 9,100 words. Asimov’s SF store.