54 x 44.3

Acrylic and oil on masonite panel

2009

Peter Vives is a Spanish actor, singer and classical pianist. He had a little part in the 2007 film Savage Grace starring Julianne Moore and Eddie Redmayne, and my flatmate and I waited until the credits at the end to find out his name, as we both found him to be, in her words, ‘so dreamy’.

I am hazy on the details of how this Nancy Drew detective work led to him finding me lying on a park bench near Bethnal Green tube wearing my painting shirt and us proceeding to my studio, which at that time was a room in my flat up the road. I think I might have found him on Facebook.

I pinned a little vintage silk tablecloth on the wall behind his head and festooned him with a vast Olympic ring like chain I’d found in a junk shop. I asked him to remove his T shirt and painted him from life.

My then flatmate has never quite got over it. ‘He looks just like Apollo’ she gasped at the finished painting. Yes, yes he does…