How the frail human heart manages to contain the rapturous power of this will forever be one of my life’s true wonders. Simply unbloggable. Neither agitated nor real.

day 3/ ii

Study: Grapes with Red Plum
57.5 x 35.5 cm
Oil on Board

It's now the middle of the night. And not just any night but the eve of the day the experts - using formulas I still can't grasp - reckon the little one will bop on down the bunny trail and say "howdy!" It's certainly because of this that I was able to take another running start at the grapes and plum and before they shrink so wrinkly small that time and dimension invert in some way that made more sense when the sentence began than it does now. Also found that there was time to post an interim entry about what happened between the last session and now. It's fair to say that getting this one study behind me will help in ways I can't quite articulate right now as drowsiness jumps me. Although I won't do any more to this study, there are elements about a new putty formula I should mention. So if things are calmer than the experts predict tomorrow, I might add to or edit this. I've already been given the all-clear by my beloved that I can paint tomorrow if I'm not otherwise engaged.

day 2/ ii

Study: Grapes with Red Plum
57.5 x 35.5 cm
(In progress)

The grand plans to maybe see this study through "tomorrow" wound up amounting to it being completely scraped back to a faceless, placeless plane of broken line and colour. In the recent weeks and months as a spectator reviewing the efforts of so many actual working painters, I've come across so many who inspire me with this scraped back, create-and-destroy approach yielding the lush surfaces of a Lascaux bison-scape. Thing about getting into working like that myself is, now that I've got reading glasses (yes I know) with a 2.0 magnification - I get to see all of that goodness r-i-i-ight up close requiring not so much as a squint or stoop. This, for me personally, makes for an ever unfolding whimsical spiral of unproductive texture mapping comparable to cloudgazing - also a personal favourite. And as much as I love it, not only can't I get anything done - it's pretty challenging to know when something has even started. Perhaps this approach will find me another time when, well, the time is right. So anyway. I mixed up a pile of paint similar to those in the pile I scraped off. And then it set-up before I could get back to it. I'm reading Berger's Shape of a Pocket at the moment on the wonderful Bev Byrnes' recommendation. This makes me feel better in the meantime when I'm contemplating mixing up another pile and then leaping into birthing partner mode as the waters go. A-ah-ooo-gah!

day 1 / ii

Study: Grapes with Red Plum
57.5 x 35.5 cm
(In progress)

Uh. Yes. More than a few scriptic scenarios have flickered past my mind's keypad over recent weeks of just how eloquently this once-scorching stop on the blogosphere might be reignited but nothing quite does it. Simply put, all of the behind-the-scenes developments of late last year so rapidly engulfed the day-to-day agitivities that there was not only scanty little focussed energy left to apply to the work, but even less to filter the world-wobbling from the profound. Agitated Realism (i) began as one nut's effort to make sense of the struggle to experience paint and all of its isms, izers and istics. This new year (ii) will be an attempt to take it up another story. I could wax gratuitous on the gravity of the challenges and vividities ahead this year contrasted with those of a year ago but - ee by gum (as they say) - that's hardly the way to go on this first blog posting of the year. No. With but a week between me and that surreal moment when I behold the Universe's Big Knockout, all I can do is (FINALLY and desperately) sling paint around in a frazzled attempt to create order, if even pictorially. Maybe even create a sense of place where these grapes and red plum can live in harmony and loving kindness with one another. It's all so completely perfect and also so completely bonkers really. That's not drawing much of a distinction between the painting of it and the living but that line's always been kinda funny. It will come. It's good to be back. It's good to reflect on one session at the easel and think of the possibility that tomorrow could see this study through. NB. Wanted to thank all of the fantastic people from all over the world (incredibly) - both for the support of the work over the last year here and also for checking in on our well-being and the status of things during the offline time. It's not easy to express in this format just how much this has meant.

Day One-Ninety-Something...7?...8?

Study: Tangerines with Clementine
57.5 x 35.5 cm
Oil on Linen over Panel

No excuses here - just some good old jubilation at having reached the top of my climb back into the light. This is not really the format or avenue for dissecting behind-the-scenes issues, but let it be sufficient to say that some matters of circumspect self-efficacy have been duly ruminated. Sometimes the passages leading out are both steep and slick, but they are part of my adventure for better or worse and they've taken me, yet again, at long last to the end of another study (and long sentence). I'm expecting any day now to be contacted by ArtNews to discuss just what goes through my mind in the days, nights and weeks that pass between swathes of paint being laid down towards the finishing of an alla prima study. I jest. But I do feel like my process (as it relates to my subject matter) and I need to have a serious come-clean about what sort of naughty preoccupations I've been having on the side centered around the human form. Between impending childbirth, parenthood and the figurative life drawing study - as much as I've tried to let it be - these have all collided to severely disrupt my enthusiastic still life arrangements of Nature's more plump and colourful, as was my creative wont. I'll have some time to work through this between now and when the figure sessions resume in a few weeks. As for this study, I haven't been more pleased to get to the better side of a shakey patch in some time. This image will likely need updating as the usual camera settings seem again outdone by the yellows, oranges and blues within the same format. In spite of much of the above, this study remains but one more segment in the forward push towards general progress. [N.B. And we are still on and excited for our big appointment with Universal Wonder in April.]

Day 196

Study: Tangerines with Clementine
57.5 x 35.5 cm
Oil on Linen over Panel
(Beginning sketch)

Thanksgiving Day in the USA. I haven't properly participated in this holiday in like 17 years and it usually pops into my agitated world here completely out of nowhere. But still, it stops me repeatedly throughout the day - wondering what nuttiness is occurring from one table to the next from North Carolina, to Virginia, to Pennsylvania. I was thinking of you all - and fondly too! For my day here, the plan was an early start at the easel, after a call to the people about ordering the parts to repair and recondition our fridge. Well the parts order was confirmed at very nearly first light, but this beginning sketch of an arrangement of citrus delights was wrapped up well after last light(!) Setting it up took way more time than usual despite a fine selection of all sorts and sizes from the trusty window box outside - at least 1-2 degrees frostier than the purpose-built item awaiting drastic repair downstairs. Seems a good deal of time is still getting away from me due to preoccupation with figure study. Some spent actually doing it. But the larger bit on researching where else I can get a session or 2 in to compliment the once-per-week dose at present that's yielding regression and digression more than progression. And as long as it's within cycling (in the rain) distance, costs less than a session in the pub, and keeps distracting crackling low-fidelity Bangles and Elton John's tracks to a minimum - then we're getting somewhere. As we race into The Season, most such life-drawing opportunities will be nudged to the rear burners. But I'm trying to make ready for January...Anyway. Today's study reminded me of Days 10-14 in January, when I was hacking and stabbing away at similar subjects with one insufficient mixture of pink, red and yellow after another, only to discover it was a chemical thang. I then got myself some Cadmium Yellow Deep and my agitated world began to revolve again. Here's hoping for a comparable breakthrough all these months later on this study here. Not asking for the world. Just some dizzyingly engaging progress. (Admittedly, some regular easel time would probably carry me a little too.)