Leave to Work

Today was the first day I have seen the artist back at work in just under a fortnight. The artist hasn't even had a proper holiday: she has been sick all this time. Anyway, this hugely important return came about towards the end of the day, just before the sun went down, and it was all done very quickly and quietly. First of all, an unwanted section of the day's newspaper was opened and its pages spread evenly along the floorboards and across the skirting board. Some white gaffer tape was used to attach the pages of the newspaper to the wall, creating a kind of wide ski slope for the residues of the materials she was about to use to slide down to the parts of the pages flat against the floor. Then she slid a tall stool towards the piece and picked up a green shoe box of materials from her table and placed them like a small stringed instrument on the seat of the stool. Within seconds, and I mean seconds, she was a picture of concentration - as if something profound in our lives had been resumed and a sweet music was being plucked. (If a light went out when she stopped working, another had just come on.) Weirdly, even the room, stripped of its festive tree, began changing beneficially. The bookshelf where the tree had been for example was suddenly more accessible. The children were drawing and writing and not just playing with toys. And not once did I hear the artist cough as she leaned her chin towards the surface of her work and worked away at it with a kind of surgeon's skill. (For a second it was almost as if the long line of traffic through the trees outside also slowed down out of a kind of respect.) No, today is the first day of the weekend and the following day after next is when the artist will be phoning up the gallery to confirm a time and day to pay their visit. So no pressure there then.