Eastbourne House, London, 12 January 2015

Having already welcomed 2015 with a New Year’s Masquerade and Forbidden art performance, it was time for a return to more conventional life group modelling. And where better to start than one of the Bethnal Green groups run by Adrian Dutton?

It turned out that the session wouldn’t be wholly conventional as I was to be reunited once more with fellow model Maurice for duo poses. We’d posed together for Adrian in July 2013 and March 2014 so were flattered to be paired for a third time; we must have been doing something right.

The twist was that most of our poses were to be asynchronous. It meant there would be fewer opportunities for direct interaction but we could fit many more poses into the evening. Artists would have a choice of pose lengths to draw.

As usual we began with a 10-minute welcome pose; on this occasion a kind of static high-five. We then got dynamic – 1 minute, 30 seconds, 2 minutes, 3 minutes – after which our asynchronous posing began.

First Maurice held a 5-minute standing pose whilst I responded to his stance with five separate 1-minute poses, circling him as I did so. The compliment was returned when I held still for 10 minutes and Maurice came up with a series of 2-minute variations.

Finally for this first half of the evening, Maurice reclined for 20 minutes while I reclined and stood for 10 minutes apiece. The break that followed could last up to half an hour for artists. Models, however, resumed with informal sitting poses after just 15 minutes for those keenest to continue drawing.

When everyone was back in their seats we had a quick flurry of dynamism – 1 minute, 30 seconds, 15 seconds – before lengthening in time. I lay down for 20 minutes while Maurice posed twice, and finally Maurice sat for 30 minutes while I posed three times.

All in all it had been a pretty thorough workout for two gentlemen with a combined age knocking around the 100 mark. As on previous occasions, we gave it a good go, put in a fair bit of variety, and tried to get the most from our contrasting body types. And also as per previous occasions, there was some excellent artwork to show for it at the end.