What is a sextet?

When I painted the original purple abstract octopuses in 2020, my friend challenged me to make a larger version of them. Those paintings are 18” x 24” each, which is already pretty large. But my friend wanted to know if I could paint six of them, and then combine them as a sextet, thus creating a 4.5-foot by 6-foot painting of an octopus.

Challenge accepted!

I laid six pieces of 18” x 24” paper together on the floor of my studio and drew some octopus tentacles with my colorful watercolor markers. When creating the composition, I made sure that if, for any reason, the six pieces were separated, an individual piece would hold up well on its own, compositionally.

Then, when I went to paint each piece, I treated each one as its own individual painting.

I wasn’t fussy about making sure that the edges all matched up because I thought it would be more interesting and engaging if they didn’t fit exactly together.

When the six paintings were completed, I was extremely happy with the outcome, so I had them framed, and they now hang in my living room. I get constant compliments on the sextet. Because it’s so unique and colorful, it really stands out, and it’s become quite the conversation piece!

Here is a photo of our big goofball, Brody, on our couch in the living room, with the sextet displayed above. I love it, and artistically, it has been my most exciting and difficult challenge yet.

I embraced this challenge with wide open arms, and I keep vowing to return to it. What do you think? Should I make another one, or should it be based on a different subject matter?

If there were prints of the sextet, would you want to buy them?

sex·tet
/sek?stet/
noun
a musical composition for six instruments or voices
a group or set of six: such asthe performers of a sextet
a hockey team
…or, of course, my octopus painting!