An abstract study alluding to a bouquet caught in the moment before giving up its scent. Irises and orchids pulled from memory rather than observation — black contours drawn as gesture, not description, as if the mark had to outrun the flower itself. The palette is bruised: oxblood, dove-grey, chartreuse spilling across a ground the colour of unwashed silk.

Where the earlier Bouquets trafficked in perfume, this one carries grief. The whites are not innocent; they are bandages. The reds do not bloom; they bleed. The drips down the canvas read as the only honest mark in the room — the one the painter could not control and did not try to.

Le Deuil des Iris — the mourning of irises. A square nocturne, forty-two inches on each side, for the flowers we keep painting after the room has gone quiet.