Discipline is the road to freedom

years back i remember seeing a photograph somewhere black and white of a geezer sitting in a messy room smoking a fag he was sitting in a chair with a fag in his hand staring in front of him at a big painting what looked like nothing as the photograph was taken in black and white it looked like he may be staring at a big grey mid grey undercoat colour rectangle like a bit of wall i thought though i liked the image overall just because i was and still am drawn to the style and aesthetic of the post war decades – before the swinging or rather minging sixties nonsense – even though i liked the atmosphere of the photograph the light his clothes and the smoking fag my initial and dominant thought was what a cunt that bloke is what’s he looking at is that what artists do the silly fuckers he’s putting it on pretending there’s something there what a twat and i moved on and forgot all about it – the following tuesday an unfurnished room in kennington two bedroomed housing association flat me and richard toshing out on a price he’s in the kitchen on hands and knees i’m floating weightless in a clear blue summer sky observing the geographical layout of planet earth many many miles below trying my best to locate something familiar some outline of a recognisable continent land mass body parts profiles of unknown faces explosions cracks in the mind music seeps from tiny openings layer upon layer of mood swings memories sharpened claws and polished posies glide across and into unfathomable openings drifting drifting over zooming in and nailing a thought about nothing only these worlds below before and about me do mean something they mean everything they supply air to breath and nourishment for my moments without them i’d be lost vapourised and no more than the galaxy of silent dust motes that circle the room this room this carcass my body the house of my existence i must do this i must make this instant into something more more white more blank more no thing more mine and it’s gone gone gone and a medium pile nine inch lambswool roller loaded heavy with johnsons magnolia emulsion rips through vertical speed obliterating all thought in a moment the next advance twist ninty degrees and in out in out like a fiddlers elbow horizontals top to bottom two metres square at a time up again and downward confuse the bastard this way and that destroy that world and in a flash here we are a fresh this square this space this new brand new world i love it i love it there it is and only it all other thought all other trace of anything is gone for the centre of my universe my creation is the only point to life what lays beyond the border is for another time what matters now is this this paint this square of the galaxy this vast infinity which is mine to play with mine to toy with mine to control and mine to serve it is everything – many years later thirty something i made the move from painting on wood to canvas. i’d done a load of stuff on nice heavy paper but i’d run out of plywood months before i’d found a used heavily oil painted square canvas about 60cm sq out front with the bulk rubbish i remembered that and dug it out from under the table and sanded it down p60 the paint was well heavy on there i sanded violently through the canvas at one point in the centre patched it up with a bit of lining paper and toshed over the whole thing with some white emulsion i can’t remember now what i painted on there i think it was a big blue screaming face i’m not sure but either way you know i really enjoyed painting on that thing i liked the way the canvas kind of pushed back against the brush the way it bounced a little almost like it was kind of alive and the fact there was no hardness and rough grain on it like on wood the brushes and fingers weren’t splintered torn to shreds and i liked having a bigger surface to work with so i got a bit excited and decided to brave the elements go to the angel and see what i could find at the old art supply shop when i came back i had three three packs of ready primed canvases 70 x 90 cm that was the biggest surface i’d thus far had to paint on and i was eager to get going so i got them all out of the packaging cleared some space and laid one out on the table now someone gave me or rather sold me an easel but i didn’t use it it wasn’t sturdy enough for pieces of plywood and i knew the new canvases would be too big for it too so that stayed collapsed in the corner and there i was paint out plans in my head and the canvas there before me all ready to go well in the mood raring to go – nothing – not a thing i couldn’t move i dare not move i was frozen on the spot transfixed on the empty space before me without the means nor the nerve to put any paint or any mark or any fucking thing on it i just stared at it and as i stared i felt this weird feeling going through my brain and body i felt this kind of straining and tearing sensation within like a bolt was tightening like a piece of timber up in the rafters of my housing was shifting and contracting it sounds bonkers but it was like something in the core of me was seasoning and all i could do was stare at the untouched canvas without an idea in my head all the plans i’d had had long since evaporated and there i was with this strange visceral sensation emanating from inside my brain i must’ve been standing there for ten minutes probably more shuffling about a bit but just standing there then finally finally i thought fuck do it but not with paint use a pencil and sketch the corner the angles of the corner of a room simple i’d done that painted that many times before my go to starting and finishing point so i leaned in chippies soft fat pencil in hand and drew the first line canvas in landscape mark two thirds the height at the right hand side there i’d done it and by the time i’d adjusted myself to draw in the next line representing the angle from wall to floor going away from the corner i stopped no no oh shit what have i done dropping the pencil i straightened up and stepped back christ what a disaster not there not that there it’s in the wrong place the length is incorrect it’s not perpendicular it’s gonna look shit what have you done quickly i got the emulsion and whited it out went into the kitchen and waited ten minutes then went back and hit it again i couldn’t bear to even look at the thing i wanted to forget all about it i don’t know why but the weight of my action seemed so heavy and wrong criminally wrong it took me a while to get over it and all i could think of was bugger that so i took the canvas and stacked it up with the others and left them for a few days i didn’t want to see them but i couldn’t stop thinking about them i continued painting as usual but on paper the canvases behind some bits of wood in a corner then after a while like i said three or four days i felt ready to get one out and have another go so i did that and laid it out on the table i could see the stripe of white emulsion and that started bugging me big time so i decided to tosh over the whole thing to even it out and anyway i really didn’t like the look of the canvas itself in fact apart from francis bacon’s paintings where he leaves big areas of un painted un primed raw canvas exposed i really don’t like at all the sign of any canvas painted or not on a painting however good the painting is to me if you can see canvas coming through the paintings not even started let alone finished so i put it on nice and heavy to make the canvas look more like a section of mist coated plaster wall the kind of surface i’m used to painting and i did the same thing to two more canvases heavy loose brush strokes lime wash stone wall of the milking shed style and went out leaving them to dry later on there i was all ready to go looking down at the canvas everything set to go and once again i’m stuck standing there eyeing the thing up incapable of making a single mark on the thing i know i want to paint the corner of a room but just cannot make up my mind where or how to start then i remember the easel yes i felt a surge of excitement like i was making progress at last after the best part of a week somethings starting to happen that’s it put the fucker on the easel so i got the thing from the clutter in the corner brushed of the cobwebs and dust and after working out how to erect it placed it within the light of the big window went and got the canvas and ceremoniously fixed the thing to it wow bloody wow i’m backing up across the room in awe of the thing before me i can’t believe what i’m looking at there it is there it is but what is it this big beautiful art thing glistening like a diamond in the sun this majestic holy portal holy fuck i left the room quite overwhelmed this is a whole other kettle of fish man i went back in it was still there still the same there it was waiting for me staring at me and all i could do was stare back i did that for a while then needed a break so went for a walk mulling over what i was going to do i knew what i wanted to do so i thought i was going to paint the corner of an empty room and that involved three lines one depicting the corner of two walls and two lines running away from the bottom in opposite angles to represent the skirting boards and floor the bit at the top would obviously be the ceiling then i was going to fill in the spaces in between and there would be part of a room easy right well i’m going to cut a long story short and stick to the nitty gritty of the matter that being my dilemma of where and how to start was not resolved on my return and it was the same frustrating ever changeable story every time i went into the room to have another look and as the song goes this went on for a couple of days but i couldn’t stay away this actually went on for four days i did though get to the point by day two where i could stay in the room with it and manage to sit down on the opposite side and observe it at the end of day when i’d finished doing my thing working on collage stuff in the other room i covered it with a blanket so as not to keep being distracted by it and cricking my neck when i was sat in front of the computer screen of an evening then i’d go to bed thinking about it there under the cover next door so sleep would come and next thing i’d wake up in the middle of the night thinking yes yes i’ve got it and into the other room i’d stride turn on the overhead light whip off the blanket back off sit in the chair looking at the thing and think no no not like that you can’t do that what are you thinking man are you completely mad and i’d stare at it some more and go back to bed no sooner had i lay down i was back on my feet in the other room and staring at the bloody thing again and so on sitting approaching retreating standing shuffling from one perspective to another and sitting again the ideas the plans tumbling around in my head contemplating this way for a while and then that way and back again and all this time what was now the best part of ten days since i’d brought them home i’d spent in this repetitive quandry these scenarios though there were incredibly frustrating anxiety ridden spells i retained a heightened sense of excitement knowing that i was involved in something wondrous knowing that a painting another kind of painting was in process this felt like an utterly different type of work a kind i’d never carried out before and it felt like and i knew it was the greatest most fulfilling kind of work i’d ever done and when i finally finally took the canvas from the easel and placed it on the work bench and painted in those three lines when those first marks were made which took perhaps twenty seconds to make i instinctively picked up the canvas again and returned it to its place on the easel by the window and myself to the chair on the opposite side of the room and i looked at it and it was like looking in on the dawn of creation and the sense of achievement the feeling of wonder was an ecstasy to me and i simply knew it was absolutely all correct and in place ready for the next stage and i guess that was when i finally got it that as it was with decorating two thirds of the time painting a room correctly was spent in preparation then the majority of the time it took to paint a picture was time spent looking i thought of that black and white photograph i’d liked and scoffed at in equal measure thirty odd years before and finally got that rothko bloke.