This painting is a vain attempt to describe human reason - symbolised by the 'checkerboard', being consumed by the fire of love.

"Love setteth a world aflame at every turn, and he wasteth every land where he carrieth his banner. Being hath no existence in his kingdom; the wise wield no command within his realm. The leviathan of love swalloweth the master of reason and destroyeth the lord of knowledge." - Bahá'u'lláh.

This was the first painting I completed. Although the word 'completion' does not adequately describe the feelings that were in my heart at the time. Nothing is ever complete to me. Even beginnings are a response to something that has gone before.

I was sitting in a studio I had hired, which was beyond my means, looking out of the window into a gloom of green and the River Tweed which ran by the converted water-mill which housed the studios. As I lay the first mark of brilliant red onto the clean white paper, I knew something profound was going on, and I was merely an onlooker. It was this painting that I sent with the idea of an illustrated edition to Gordon Kerr, the manager of the Bahá'í Publishing Trust.