Okay, so at its heart it's basically just a brown spiral. But I like to think it's a brown spiral painted with a certain amount of panache.
I can't remember what initially motivated this one, although I suspect the concept arose as a development and refinement of Open to Interpretation: they're both spiral-based abstracts painted in acrylics on two-foot-square canvases, and both feature the use of a wide-nibbed gold marker pen. This time, however, I painted the entire surface of the canvas, including wrapping around the edges, and I used far more variation in the colours - in particular, the browns grow lighter and lighter until they become almost more of a cream colour towards the centre, where the lines between segments also grow far less distinct, suggesting a light source at the distant end of a spiralling tunnel.
I suppose I could have just named it Chocolate Vortex in English, but it occurred to me that I could put the title in French and make a reference to Pain au Chocolat, so I did that instead because it was more fun.
Having completed the painting and gone looking for a home for it, I ended up with the idea of hanging it from one corner to create an unusual 45-degree presentation, and although the picture theoretically works just as well any way up, I've decided I like the diagonal best, and I've even chosen a favourite corner to hang it from; the photo shown here presents the painting at what is now my preferred angle.
