Dissolving

Oil on linen, [formaat] cm. A seated nude seen from behind, the body resting on a green plane against a warm orange ground. The pose is classical, the spine and shoulders turning away, but the work is left deliberately uneven. The buttock and the foot are carried furthest, the most fully worked passages in the painting, while the upper back and head soften and dissolve into the ground. That difference does the work: the eye is led down and across the figure, from what fades to what is fully there. It is a study in how much finish a form actually needs to hold the gaze.