Through the gloom …
With its ash-grey palette, the soft sighs of the sitters’ bodies and their self-possession within the group, you don’t need the title to know this is an image of sorrow.
Parental leave …
The painting, from 2015-16, depicts the aftermath of an event the artist Celia Paul and her sisters have anticipated all their lives: their mother’s death. Paul has even written of her plans to make the painting before her mother died.
Silent presence …
For four decades, the artist has been honing her meditative portraits of family members and herself. In her memoir, she described this composition as a rose bush – each an individual bloom united by the stem of family history. Though not depicted, she is the invisible presence, quietly making and thinking alongside her sisters.
Higher love …
This work has an air of religious contemplation, suggested by the pale shifts recalling nuns’ habits. Made specially for the sitting, they add a ritualised aspect to both the gathering and the creation of the painting.
Victoria Miro, N1, to 20 December; Celia Paul’s memoir, Self-Portrait, is out now
