diary of the progress on the Stations of the Cross, A Personal Diary, January 2007

Today, in the studio I make at the Salle Polyvalante in the Mairie of my village north of Nice... the beginnings. A 30' roll of canvas (perhaps two thirds of what will be used, perhaps less than that...) is laid upon the floor and

the panel on which it will be cut is set up.

The 'Stations' will be 200 cms tall and 83 cms wide and these panels will each support a sheet of that canvas, so that I can work either against the wall — but at an angle — or flat, on tressles, for when it is important that the charcoal or ink or paint doesn't drip or run. Just to hand, a desk, with the charcoal and inks and the Moleskine Sketchbook that contains almost all of the preparatory material...

I begin with a scrap of canvas paper against two panels, just to be used to the scale...

and here the first marks are made:

— a hand pierced by the nail:

Monday 8th January

Above, ready for action against the sunlight...

which has consisted of cutting the canvases!

The path of canvases...

The sheets can be tucked over the top of the table planks at the Salle and the work done at that angle, two or three at a time... I have put tissue paper at the foot, to catch all the charcoal debris...

Then home to finish final sketches of each one.

Tuesday 9th January

Today, in preparation, I read and studied the book.

Tomorrow, I make the pictures.

Wednesday 10th January

Above, after completing 18 canvases in their first charcoal layer... Maybe two months of sketching and pondering and looking come to fruition in six hours' dusty scrawling with the shattering stubbly charcoal from the logs, on thirty square metres of canvas... There are 18 pictures — and there now will be 21 in all — but it is one work.

It had seemed a disadvantage to have to empty the Salle Polyvalante for a day mid way through my work (for the weekend to come) and yet that enforced timetable has proved like the flaw on which the greatest crystals grow...

Thursday 11th January

A day of reflection gazing at the under-drawings...

Friday 12th January

Above, mon vieux holds forth... The first visitors and the first celebration; not that the pictures are finished, but to have started is the first triumph!

at the sight of the valley...

Saturday 13th January

Above, the lunch of Solomon and the artist... Grand Cros 1995 and a Beaujolais Nouveau of 1978, fugitive bliss with the Mont d'Or... We discuss theology.

Later, company to tidy the scraps...

Sunday 14th January

Above, M. le Maire de Duranus makes a speech at the Fête des Vœux for the New Year; I have had to empty the studio for this occasion at which the Galette des Rois is offered to the population of the village — with sparkling wine of course...

I do my reportage act...

It is odd to be in 'my' studio with a crowd and faces so close; I am finding ideas for that sense of proximity... We do not see in 'stills' and from this supposedly inadequate camera come more charcoally images that have more life...

Monday 15th January

Above, village life goes on; a day of 'admin.' and of chewing things over...

Tuesday 16th January

Above, trusty Cauliflower laden with a batch of table-tops to be taken to the Salle Polyvalante; the picture was taken in front of the village church — for which I hope also to make a smaller (!) set of Stations — and where there was still the village Christmas crêche in which a model of the church appears strange beside the actual church...

In the right-hand image of the crêche you can just see up on the top right a model of the St Michel Chapel...

that overlooks the village by many hundreds of feet...

So, boards and all, today I repossess the Salle Polyvalante and the 21 Stations will now be placed upright each on their own surface, and in order, around the room...

The room in readiness, for...

the return of the scrolls...

to be placed around the room, for the next stage of composition...

Above, Stations I-VII along the north wall; below [left] IV-VI and [right] X-XII.

Wednesday 17th January

Above, contre-jour shadows on a window at the Chinese mission in Marseille; I am over for the day to see the gallery for a group show in March [click here] and with a friend needing a visa for China we have made a day of it. I cannot escape the Stations — I mean, what is it about tall narrow compositions that is so appealing?! (And they are so Chinesey!)

— and later, at lunch, trees still with leaves! — the sight of the waitress without her head also made me think about how much we need in a picture, or don't...

And so to home — to a more seasonal valley of Chinese scroll mists too.

Thursday 18th January

Above, cold enough for a scarfe now, after raising the horizon on Station III and sketching in a worn right hand...

Friday 19th January

To Nice, to buy canvas (for three supplementary post-Resurrection scenes) and fixative and supplies...

Saturday 20th January

Above, above the clouds; on a cloudy day there is only one way out, to rise above the clouds;

and, anxious with the final few problems to solve, the metaphor was apt; with a friend we drove up to beyond the clouds — by Bonson and on to Toudon and on up, then with passes and valleys beyond, to re-enter the cloud again in time to eat...

On the way, I add to my collection of dead trees, here at —

— and at its summit [right] a strangely Golgotha-like terrain of broken ground.

The headland over Gourdon in the pinkinsh evening light, but over the edge the entirety of the Alpes Maritimes is wooly with complete cloud cover.

Sunday 21st January

Above, breaking charcoal to have disciples break bread...

Monday 22nd January

Above, with my Florentine cuddly, studio-mascot Santo, we start to believe we're there... What had I learned from yesterday's voyage in the mountains? — that colour emerges from grays...

The end is in sight.

So much so that one has a temptations, um, to pontificate somewhat...