The Twins
13-28 February 2020
Brockley Gardens
It was May time, the 25th I think and it was a Saturday I remember, about 1 o’clock when I started. I was tired that day and had a sore back because I had been to the osteopath that morning. It hurt so, I couldn’t do my dungarees up - my back was swollen and achy. We had these red geraniums on the window sill of the flat. I had been thinking about green and red. So I started in the afternoon - the tiredness strangely making me feel quite calm. I was determined to do four paintings at once which is what I did, all different sizes. Green and red in different shades and dilutions. Tom was there bringing me tea and water and we stopped for food. I spent hours mixing the paint actually, the prep took some time. Most of the day spent mixing and stretching. But in the summer its like… there’s no rush. The smell and the air was beautiful and the two black and white cats next door were playing on the table. They wanted to play all the time. The geraniums were sizzling.
The pair of paintings were at the end of the group on the floor, under the tree with the oval bright green leaves. Strange size stretchers I bought as part of a second hand bulk from somebody. I decided to do a pair because its something I don’t normally do and they felt too small to be just one on their own. Two of something always seems to be problematic, but these two canvases just felt like brothers or something from the outset. They were no problem. The black was quite purple and one of the reds was pinker than a red orange. The painting finally happened at dusk.
