Creative progress

I had a great time in NYC. With this month's brief in mind, the trip made me think that in some ways holidaying is the closest thing adults get to extended play: Exploration, novelty, immersion.

That said, I did almost zero art. "Almost zero" being a water painting on slate that was on offer in the NY botanical gardens in The Bronx. At first the speed at which the water evaporated frustrated me, but I soon realised that the drying effect was the point of the exercise, and that it did in fact enhance what I was trying to do.

I'm always fascinated by the way things look, and never more than when I'm in an unfamiliar place. I was staying with an old school friend who now lives in Manhattan. The borough is a very impressive - but grey - urban landscape. I won't bore you with my endless holiday photos of it. Suffice to say that due to the general lack of colour around me, I seemed to become sensitive to it when it did present itself.

Here is a fruit salad selection in a minimart.

And one evening a spectacular sunset painted the sky behind Manhattan's concrete, steel and glass. Here's that view of that from my friend's apartment window.