Some kind of undone woman challenged his ponderous glower. She was not
yet Salome. She was only just the hope of the man.
Her fingers, splayed triumphant atop her prize like some poised Queen Spider,
had been born fully realized from a few bold Sienna strokes. Reaching into the
maelstrom of his mind, where dreams break upon memories, the painter had grasped
that hand and pulled it gasping from the depths. Endless other flotsam flailed
in that wild storm of the imagination but they were left to flounder until, one
after another, those naissant imaginings finally despaired and submerged lost
into the dark. He had saved that one breathtaking painted passage though. He had
plucked it from the wreckage and hurled it into the world. The sinister hand had
collapsed upon the Sinopia washed canvas and took breath. It lay there now,
relishing its salvation, and exultating in its own perfection.
The woman's gaze though, little more than a hinted wash of brown tones, stared
back at the creator that had left her but a notion. Where there were no eyes,
they did not question. They demanded nothing of their God. Silently, that thin
layer of oils spoke only of the sadness of the unborn. His Salome's features
could not be found floating in the frenzied waters of his psyche though. Nothing
sublime was surviving that tempest. No beauty hailed his attention. She would
only be if he worked her up from nothing.
Still, the man just sat staring at this ghost of a thing, this fleshless frame
for a dream. The potent weight of that next paint stroke immobilized him.
The Rue de Grenelle studio was inadequate. Light was poor and quiet impossible.
When Gilles Montagne lifted his mass up from the end of the bed, his restless
pacing was immediately confronted by his confinement. Cornered, he swivelled to
again contemplate the easel. His heavy, weathered brow remained dour. There was
perhaps an hour remaining. He could not use colour by candlelight. Spinning, he
was already within reach of the flimsy yellow curtains that were among the
residue of a former resident and he grasped them both to frame his face against
the too narrow window.
Nothing on that Paris street could solve his problem. No aspect of the waning
Sun would inspire a solution. He sought, he thought, distraction. The gnarled
paintbrush was drawn from his teeth to be clenched in a powerful fist. Now, as
he beat that balled and angry hand against the ledge and wall and on and on in
metronomed demand for answers, always the hog's bristles were kept clear of any
contact.
He was not grand, M Montagne, but stout.
A filthy nightshirt is the loose drapery for this barrel-chested nude.
Counter pointing his heavy wrists are tiny ankles but this unfortunate feature
was hidden within thick stockings. These grey, unwashed things were slowly
trying to abandon their charges and had already crept far enough to find their
tips dragging along under the soles of their distracted master.
The painter was still young enough to be so considered but his brow and
glowering visage wholly suggested that he was much closer to the midway mark of
his years. Even smiling, this face would maintain the illusion of maturity.
He did not smile. Even as his dark eyes were lit by a spark of insight and
widened with resolve, his thick lips remained clenched. The fist unclenched and
the brush was flicked away so that the man's gross hand could seize instead upon
the necessary tool: the knife.
The free hand of the man clasped the canvas edge and trapped it. For a breath,
the knife wielding vice held back and the artist stared at that splendid,
monstrous painted hand. That claw defined her. The wicked, playful digits could
only belong to Salome. Those maddeningly few smears of oiled pigments told the
whole story with sublime perfection.
Up came the pallet knife and scraped it all away in a single, almost hateful,
sweep. Reversed, it came back to massacre what memories remained and then that
knife flew an ungainly arc across the too small room.
The initial preparatory sketch, thrown together in a couple of hours at work.
Variations of the sketch (using the magic of the computer) to find my composition once I had the confirmed proportions of the fresco board.
The failed fresco
Undertaking an oil painting of the subject
The third is blurred badly but gives a better idea of the colours.
