Yet another #Difficult Women…

Gillian Cross #Difficult Woman 2 author of The Demon Headmaster…..among several other books….

There seems to be an inexhaustible supply ( of #difficult women!) fortunately!  …. 

I will tell you some of them ….. but later ( that’s a cliff hanger!!)   The project is getting very exciting and I am loving it….    Doing these portraits has really gripped me – it seems to be all I want to do…. !!   just painting myself isnt what I want to do –  its the fascination and challenge of painting another face is so … exciting and terrifying….  Yesturday particularly I was  casting around for someone to paint NOW!     Robert calls me Miss Instant….? oh well.!!!

As I said I have several really Difficult women lined up ready ….. but no one for just then….

At one o’clock  I rang Gillian Cross to ask her if she would pose for me ….. she was just unpacking the car after a few days away – she said    “yes, she could come today between 2 and 4…. fantastic ….. I had to ‘get a wriggle on’ …..

Gillian had already  agreed to be involved in this difficult woman project  – I wanted to talk with her about how women post menopause, can experience a real rush of creativity etc ….. because she is a writer she can express these ideas so well…..

I write because I love telling stories and finding out about things. My stories don’t have ‘messages’, but I like to write about people in difficult and dangerous situations. I’m interested in how they cope and the decisions they make.

www.gillian-cross.co.uk

It was very tantalising having her here – because I wanted to talk to her – and we did talk for quite a bit of the sitting, about the similarities and differences between her creative process and mine

I spend most of my time writing and looking after my family. I also edit the parish magazine in the village where I live, and I travel around quite a lot, talking to children and adults. (It’s pretty hard to stop me talking.)’

www.gillian-cross.co.uk

…. Its useful for me to  chat initially  with the sitter, to see how they move,  and holds her head etc, and to make sure she is comfortable……

Rather unusually I decided to go straight in with paint, rather than spending the first  session doing a drawing ….. don’t know why – maybe it was my excitement at getting into the paint…..

What you can see here is the final 30/40 minutes of painting ….. the pose she was in was difficult to hold – and difficult to get back into after a necessary rest – so knowing the time limit I made the choice to stop pussy-footing – trying to  ‘get things in the right place’  and just go for it…. what the heck….!    Gillian says too ‘When you’re a writer, you never know where the next book will lead.’ that is what I experience too…. with a few things that aren’t right I am really quite pleased with this.

Thank you Gillian….!

By the way – if you think you qualify and have a (male) family member who can honestly vouch and will sign a certificate that you are #difficult –  please  get in touch!