Self Portrait After Matisse’s Black Table,
Oil on canvas, 2026
A red table stood in my mother’s studio. I remember entering and finding her seated at her writing table, drawing or studying. A chair was always kept for visitors, though one learned to check first that it did not hold a palette of fresh colours.
The studio was a sacred space. When acquaintances asked to see it, she would decline politely. She did not wish to become a spectacle in her own working place. She guarded this temple of creativity, understanding that only after prolonged solitude and concentrated attention could a painting truly come into being.
I was privileged not only to enter her studio freely, but to sit at that red table, drinking coffee and speaking with her while she worked. Long after her death, the table remains with me as a symbolic presence — an anchor in the solitude of my deepest creative moments. In this way my mother continues to accompany me, perhaps observing the work of her student, and, I hope, with pride.
Oil on canvas, 2026
