cave, London, 19 February 2019

The last duo booking of the Valentine’s season for me and Esther was for life drawing at cave in Pimlico. As ever, we were greeted with great warmth by Karen, the owner and driving force behind this artist-led retail space for ‘art, vintage and up-cycling‘. It is truly one of those rare places packed with curios where everything is interesting.

The layout inside cave seems to have altered on each occasion we visit, and this time was no exception. We would be deeper within the shop area with artists around us on three sides. Fortunately there was plenty of seating available as we had succeeded in attracting a record turn-out for the group.

Esther and I had promised ourselves a gentle snuggly session with nothing strenuous or painful. Karen does like her short poses to be very short, however, so straight away we went into dynamic mode, making all manner of spontaneous shapes: five 1-minute poses followed by two of 5-minutes, and ending the first half with two of 10-minutes.

Rewards were immediate. During the interval, Karen offered teas, wines, shortbreads and cakes to everybody present. I plumped for a snifter of red wine plus some apricot Swiss roll; not recognised as a classic combination, but it ticks my bon viveur boxes. After these refreshments we rounded-off the evening with two 25-minute poses.

Throughout this session we were serenaded by long lost sounds from cave’s fantastic CD collection, with vintage Prince getting most prominent play time this evening. The mix is usually eclectic, although Karen has decided that Barry White is wrong for life drawing – there’s always magic and weirdness here… but then that is surely art.