I had a ball painting these. But I’m happy they are finished are ready to decamp to the galleries.

These mannequins were commissioned by Carré d’artistes and will be available in their galleries starting in August. Several artists were selected. I’m curious to see how the other artists finished their ladies. Carré will show the mannequins in their French galleries, all 13 of them, and some of their other galleries wordwide. I do not yet know where mine will be but I’ll post when I do.

The mannequin with the key had to be edited. I like this first version. It was my favorite but when the agent asks for changes, changes must be made. Agents know their clients.

Mannequins are coated with an industrial strength paint that nothing sticks to. Before I could lay the paint or spray it I had to sand the pieces. Mannequins come in parts. They are easy to put together and take apart but sanding them and gluing them as I had to do was painful. I hurt my back to the point that I had to see a chiropracter. Before I could see the chiro, I spent ten days painting or lying down. I painted with coffee, first thing in the morning, and painted with a glass of rosé in the evenings.

Here is an instagram video of me and one of the girls riding the elevator.

I sanded for two days straight on a city bench in front of my atelier. Parisians rarely address you, unless they need to tell you what you are doing wrong, so it was surprising that every person who walked by had a word for me. Seeing me with all those body parts on the bench in the sun brought them out of their sidewalk grimace. One man, a bit of a nutter, offered to model nude for me. After he left, a real nutter— more like raging insane entity— sauntered up. I knew he was beyond repair, not from the shine in his eyes but from the way he held his pants above his exposed butt cheeks. Luckily I’d finished sanding by then and decamped from the city bench.

After a short vacation I’ll be back in the atelier with a brand new and top secret project that I’ve been working on for a year. Here is an image of the silicon molds.

Under the silicon is the secret sculpture. There are four and they are pairs. They will be completely different from my contemporary realism paintings. I’m going political thanks to #Brexit.