A MODERATELY MOTTLED WEEK - SUMMER SKIES THIS MORNING

Following the meeting last week after a mere two days respite from the snot and throbbing, the damn ‘Flu’ was back again with a vengeance. As a result, I spent Saturday, Sunday and Monday back in bed as sick as a sausage in dirty dish water. As opposed to feeling well enough to do so come Tuesday however, and the shear boredom finally forced me to haul myself out of bed where I at least got some of the awaiting donkey work done – the kind of stuff such as attaching hanging brackets to canvases and writing statements which takes longer than you imagine but always put off until the last minute in the lead up to an exhibition. Also, because it’s cheaper here to buy the best quality ready-made canvases than it is to knock them up yourself, I ventured out to purchase a new one from, of all places the DIY store across town, for what should be the final piece for the show – a fairly medium sized affair, but somewhat ambitious arrangement planned where the countless encounters with previous configurations should come together in a kind of climax of mood and composition. I laid the ground for it on Wednesday morning, and the current use of greys just seems to be getting better and better. What appears at first to be a flat square of lifelessness within a minute or two becomes a subtle display of colour with enough going on that it could almost be left in its current state. Indeed, if the comments I got from some friends were to be believed, and if I had any mercenary sense at all, then it should be left as it is – You get pieces of work like this occasionally - ‘Lucky Canvases’ we call them in the trade, since it seems that from the word go everything you do to them comes off.

Anyhow, viewing most of what I have on the go on Wednesday night over a couple of beers, Anka, Bogdan and Edyta believed the newly begun painting to be not just finished but ‘rather nice’, with Edyta deciding initially that it was her favourite. Hell.., if only it were that simple – I had to try to explain that yes, if I was a painter and decorator then agreed – yeah, I’d be happy with the results too. Truth is though; if someone else had produced the thing then I would be happy with it. Unfortunately as a painter it’s just not the way it works however – You just can’t skip the journey to get there… Fortunately, the reassuring thing was that they seemed to take to the finished work as well – thank god!

‘Lucky Canvas’ it may well be then, but such comments do make you chew over your overall intensions, so I spent the day before yesterday giving it a quick look of approval in passing before popping out to stock up on provisions for the Christmas shut-down and yesterday feeling reluctant to touch it again until I’ve given myself enough time to see the futility in leaving it alone. Actually, it might be best left until after the seasonal festivities anyway. There’s plenty of time come the new year to get stuck in before the show anyway, and we have a trip to Warsaw planned next week to see the New Year in and to approach a couple of galleries to take the drawings on, on a delivery/sales basis. There’s also an interesting exhibition of current Polish painting on at Zachęta we want to see which should also prove useful before I push on.

Talking of seasonal festivities, and I popped out to the pub last night to grab a little of the hustle and bustle we’ve learnt to expect at this time of year back in England but there was me and only the barman to keep me company for most of the evening, prompting me to think that perhaps Daniel was right for a change about Polish traditions when he warned me not to expect too much excitement at this time of year (his off beam list to-date includes: mute bar staff, no chance of finding brown sugar or gift vouchers in Poland and never referring to academic professors on a first name basis)… Anyway, he’d informed me with the confidence of a man who knows that the majority here traditionally, and to a certain extent out of duty to be with family, simply retire in-doors from Christmas Eve, when the main Christmas meal of Carp is eaten in a long drawn out process reminiscent of the church rituals here, to the day after Boxing Day. It may have been late in the day, but the hangover this bright Christmas morning is proof enough that Daniel was wrong once again… Around nine-thirty the door of ‘Taverna’ was flung open like floodgates as the hordes poured in, leaving me with little alternative than to pick up the night where it should have begun three hours earlier! With Dominika off home to do her own family duty there was little need to pack up early anyway, and with Jerzy (the English speaking guy I know in ‘Taverna’) suddenly parked next to me, along with his mates Andrzej, Andrzej and Andrzej we began our own well worn Christmas traditions by exercising our drinking arms and in-between draughts and singing sea shanties partaking in a little arm wrestling with the looser having to buy the drinks - This is clearly a bona fide Polish tradition as all three Andrzej’s along with Jerzy, who looked to be the beatable one, were visibly well practiced in the art, leaving me well out of pocket by the end of the evening! That said, and I’m sure the flu had something to do with my lack of power and prowess though!

For now, from what looks like a summer’s day here in bright and beautiful Białystok -Wesołych Swiąt!