248. Affogato

248. Affogato, 2025, Öl auf Leinwand, 15 × 20cm, (Darryn Ansted)

Here is a painting of an Affogato, a scoop of ice cream in coffee. It is in a decorative espresso cup. I finished it today, now, in the lacuna between Christmas and New Year in Germany. It took a few sessions over a few weeks.

I like the paintings of Pierre Soulages, Nicolas de Stael and countless others and I don’t know if they thought about painting in deep philosophical terms. I think they were quite concrete about it. The curators and writers on art however bring more colorful kinds of sentiments into the reception of artwork, and, for better or worse, it is their books that give the elusive link to another consciousness in the most comprehensive way. They also remind me that I am only now an interpreter of this painting like everybody else. It does not after all have a stable truth.