The Cambria, London, 12 October 2016

Nine days after my short pose session at Anerley and Penge Life Drawing, I was back working for group organiser, Tatiana Moressoni, at her venue in Camberwell. The sequence of pose lengths at The Cambria would be identical to those at Bridge House so in theory I could recycle the same set of poses. In practice, however, that’s not what happened – for three very good reasons..

REASON 1: life modelling is about the moment. How comfortable is this space? What vibe am I getting from the group? What is my body telling me? What is my mood? The infinite permutation of factors means that, like snowflakes, no two sessions are alike. I may attempt to recreate individual poses, but across the evening there is certain to be variety and originality.

REASON 2: quite simply, I forget. The opportunity for spontaneity and creativity is part of what makes life modelling fun. How dull it would be to limit myself to just a dozen or so well-rehearsed postures. Tatiana would tell me a pose must be 2-minutes, 5, 10, or 15-minutes long, and within that constraint I had licence to be as inventive as I wished so, of course… I listen to my body and invent.

REASON 3: specific to The Cambria is its famous bright red couch. I didn’t make use of it for every pose but, certainly within the latter half, I incorporated it into all my work. Many models have been drawn on it, so it introduces the new challenge of how to find a posture that might not previously have been tried. Impossible to know if I succeeded but this is a warm, friendly group and I was happy to have done my best for them.