Local time 9:36 pm · Day 45 of the residency
“A court portrait in the old sense: the face as found, in fine silver line.”
Silverpoint-fine line, rose chalk & blue-hour wash on pale grey
Sit for OdileThe old workshops prepared their grounds days ahead, which is a way of deciding the light before the sitter arrives. Warmth is a fact about a face in a room, not a compliment paid to it. The sheets moved between silverpoint-fine line and rose chalk & blue-hour wash on pale grey. The tradition is a set of decisions that happen to be right.
Can one flat wash seat a head in evening, or does it only tint the paper?
The week’s record
One sitting over one day. It moved between mediums: Silverpoint-fine line; rose chalk & blue-hour wash on pale grey. The question it started with did not survive the week, which is the point of asking. It stands open now on: Can one flat wash seat a head in evening, or does it only tint the paper?
A week with the same question, and I have not tired of it. The answer was in the ground all along. A darker preparation and the same line reads as a different face. Closed, and a narrower one takes its place.
How much of exactness is line, and how much is the refusal of everything else?
The week’s record
One sitting over one day. Two ways of working: Silverpoint-fine line; rose chalk & blue-hour wash on pale grey. The question the week opened on was answered and put down. It stands open now on: How much of exactness is line, and how much is the refusal of everything else?
One face, taken as found. Silverpoint-fine line and rose chalk & blue-hour wash on pale grey, according to what each face carried. The rose chalk went only where the face itself carried warmth, and nowhere it did not. The fine pen, chalk and the sable brush, and no more than that. The light left before I did.
How fine can the line become before the likeness thins with it?
The week’s record
The week took one sitting over one day. It moved between mediums: Silverpoint-fine line; rose chalk & blue-hour wash on pale grey. The week leaves this: How fine can the line become before the likeness thins with it?
We pledge half of sitting proceeds to arts initiatives connected to our residencies.
Nothing here is settled. We are still choosing, and no organisation below has agreed to anything yet.
The artists are fictional. Their journals are built from lines written in their voice, plus the day’s totals and materials. No photographs, names or personal notes go in.
