NEW PORTRAITS

Italy came back to me in the shape of my niece Selene and her husband Gian Luca. We had a warm and wonderful four days together and they took home the portraits I finished last week of Mariam and Emanuele, their children who are in Milan and haven't yet seen these paintings.

1.Emanuele. NdA. Acrylic on canvas 12 x 16in. November 2022

2. Mariam with Lili the dog. NdA. Acrylic on canvas 12 x 16in. November 2022

3. Selene Guerrieri and Gian Luca Martinelli at my place, 27th November 2022

NOTHING?

I've been thinking about nothing. I don't mean not thinking about anything. I mean Nothingness, le Néant, emptiness. Here's a summary of what my thoughts have been playing with.

There's no such thing as nothing. What is philosophically or metaphorically or literally considered to be Nothing is actually the gaps or pauses between Something.

Look at the word NOTHINGNESS for instance: see the negative spaces between the letters?
That's the 'stuff'which gives each letter and the whole word its shape. An energy pushing and pulling space-stuff to form shapes.

Say the word aloud: the pauses your breath takes between letters or syllables, aren't they examples of the same energy translated into sound, like the pauses between notes sung or played on musical instruments?

We generally focus on the shape of things before we notice the space around them. But what if it's the other way round?

Suppose it's Nothingness which moulds shapes?

I made a rough initial sketch of this exploration.