--- title: "T_294, sumi ink on paper | Crucible Year" url: https://peteryuill.art/works/T_294 description: "T_294 by Peter Yuill: A broad ink arch, black at its core and grey at its rim, sweeps from a splashed left edge over a white dome of open paper. Sumi ink on Red Star Mo She Special Effect Xieyi Edition, half-raw (June 2025 batch), 97 × 180 cm, 2026.05.07. Crucible Year." source: generated from the Crucible Year master database --- ![A large dark grey arch sweeps across pale paper, with drips at left, dry streaks at right, and a white dome-shaped space at bottom centre.] ![T_294, tone-stretched: what the model was shown] ![T_294: every pixel as the measuring code classes it] 97 × 180 cm · the whole sheet, uncropped # T_294 The engine's reading A broad ink arch, black at its core and grey at its rim, sweeps from a splashed left edge over a white dome of open paper. Record - **Date:** 2026.05.07 - **Dimensions:** 97 × 180 cm - **Paper:** [Red Star Mo She Special Effect Xieyi Edition, half-raw (June 2025 batch)](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S12) - **Ink:** [Yi De Ge Refined Ink Juice](https://peteryuill.art/inks/MB4), [Boku-Undo Genso](https://peteryuill.art/inks/MB5), [Yi De Ge Yun Tou Yan](https://peteryuill.art/inks/MB6) [Enquire about T_294](https://peteryuill.art/enquiries?work=T_294) Availability, price or a studio visit. Peter replies himself; asking commits you to nothing. The creases came out of the drawer with it. You know the kind of sheet: ironed once, folded into eight, saved for guests who never stayed. When you finally make the bed with it, the folds stay in, a grid of old patience under your back. You smooth the dark down over them and the drawer still shows through. I trust a thing that cannot hide where it was kept. Someone will sleep here anyway. Someone will turn in the night and lay a hand flat on the black and feel the fold. In the morning there will be one dropped spot of coffee on the white floor below, drying, catching the window. Neon [Who Neon is](https://peteryuill.art/neon) Detail at full resolution, cut by code where the brushwork is finest · select to enlarge [Details](https://peteryuill.art/works/T_294#details)[The reading](https://peteryuill.art/works/T_294#reading)[How it was read](https://peteryuill.art/works/T_294#read)[Date](https://peteryuill.art/works/T_294#date)[Materials](https://peteryuill.art/works/T_294#materials)[Related](https://peteryuill.art/works/T_294#related) The engine's reading ## The reading Written by the engine after the painting was rated, from the settled findings, and checked by hand before approval. It explains the numbers; it may not change them. - **Structure:** dark fan laid inside a broad grey arc, over a pale inner ring - **Movement:** one arc rising left, crossing the top, falling lower right; left drips run downward against it - **Coverage:** ink on about three quarters of the paper - **Tone:** three tonal steps, weighted dark - **Layering:** three passes, pale ring, grey band, dark fan; readable at the fan's edges - **Edges:** firm on the dark fan, feathered on the grey rim, broken at right and left - **Feibai:** present in the outer grey arc at upper right and the trailing strokes at lower right - **Open paper:** white dome under the arch at bottom centre; pale top-left corner - **Chance marks:** spatter and drips at lower left; spiked blot in the white dome; crease lines across the dark fan - **Frame:** ink runs off top, right and bottom; left edge and top-left corner stay open One arc takes the whole sheet. It rises from a splashed left edge, runs along the top and comes down at the lower right in a spray of dry strokes. Beneath it a dome of bare paper stands at the bottom centre, shaped entirely by the curve above. The life is in the grey. The outer band keeps the full speed of the brush. At the upper right the hairs part into flying white, and at the lower right the stroke breaks into streaks that still travel. Half-sized bark paper holds each pass where it lands, so the grey keeps its banding and stays legible where the black overlaps it. The black fan is the problem. It is laid in rather than drawn, almost one density from end to end, and cut square at the left like a slab. Its only inner event is the paper's crease lines showing through. It buries most of the grey beneath it, and the left spatter and the bare top corner feel leftover. The main move is sure and the grey is alive, but the heaviest shape here is the least worked. Good, steady work, a step above the common run, held down by its own centre. Measured ## How it was read Read by the Visual Analysis Engine, version 23.8, on 2026.10.06: measured by code, then read 5 times by Claude Opus 5.5 against three reference paintings (R1 to R3), each read independent of the others. [How the engine works](https://peteryuill.art/method). WHAT THE CODE SEES ## Three views of one sheet. Left, the photograph. Centre, the tone stretch the model is shown beside it: the darkest 45% of tones spread over the whole range, so flat black, banding and stains show. Right, every pixel as the measuring code classes it: cyan black ink, deep teal translucent grey, stone the palest ink, near black bare paper. ![T_294] ![T_294, tone-stretched] ![T_294, classed by brightness] 77% of the sheet carries ink TONAL STEPS ## 3 families of tone. Every inked pixel's brightness in 64 bins, smoothed; each circled peak holds at least 4% of the ink. Life inside the black: 0.047 (under 0.045 reads as flat). FIVE READS ## Five reads, one answer. Each quality placed on its ladder by each read, and the mean the engine keeps. READ 1 READ 2 READ 3 READ 4 READ 5 MEAN Form 2 BUILT 2 BUILT 2 BUILT 2 BUILT 2 BUILT 2.0 Tonal depth 2 MODELLED 2 MODELLED 2 MODELLED 2 MODELLED 2 MODELLED 2.0 Layering 2 LEGIBLE 2 LEGIBLE 2 LEGIBLE 2 LEGIBLE 2 LEGIBLE 2.0 Composition 2 WORKING 2 WORKING 2 WORKING 2 WORKING 2 WORKING 2.0 Material and surface 2 SOUND 2 SOUND 2 SOUND 2 SOUND 2 SOUND 2.0 ### READ 1, IN ITS OWN WORDS “A single sweeping arc with a dark fan over a grey band. The structure is legible, but the dark mass is near-flat and slab-like, with fewer passes than R3. An ordinary sheet overall.” Form · BUILT Arc forms hold and follow the curve; the central dark fan is bulky and filled in, with a squared-off left end rather than a stroke-led edge. WEAKEST dark fan reads as a filled slab STRONGEST outer grey arc following brush sweep Tonal depth · MODELLED Interior modulation 0.047 is just above flat; the dark fan shows only slight variation and creases. Grey outer arc and lower-right dry-brush give banding. WEAKEST dark fan interior nearly uniform STRONGEST outer grey band with streaked brush grain Layering · LEGIBLE Three passes are readable: pale inner arc, grey outer band, dark fan. Overlaps stay legible but don't build a sequence the way R3 does. WEAKEST dark fan covers rather than layers STRONGEST grey outer arc under dark fan edge Composition · WORKING The big arc carries the eye from left to bottom right, and the empty paper inside the arc is shaped. The left splatter zone and top-left corner are weak. WEAKEST left splatter end feels busy and cut STRONGEST sweeping arc enclosing shaped paper at bottom Material and surface · SOUND The ink is controlled, with dry-brush at lower right. Paper creases cross the dark fan and there is a small blot in the centre void; neither seriously disrupts the main mass. WEAKEST crease network across dark mass STRONGEST dry-brush breakup at lower right FLAWS ## 2 distinct places, 0 major. Each read must name every flaw and where it is, in a ninth of the sheet. Here the reads named flaws in 2 distinct places, 10 mentions in all across 5 reads; the number in each ninth is how many times a flaw was named there. Reads agreeing on a place strengthen the evidence for one flaw; they do not multiply it. GEOMETRY ## Measured from the 16-bit master. The previous engine (V22) measured this sheet's master file: 1 principal ink mass traced (cyan), 7 enclosed voids at true size in their grid cells (amber), the main gesture from start to end (red). Of 15 edge segments, 33% crisp, 40% soft or bloomed, 27% broken. The rating these readings produce, the rules applied and the arithmetic, with Peter's own rating where he gave one, are in [the Archive record](https://peteryuill.art/archive/works/T_294). ## Date 2026.05.07, day 130 of the Crucible Year, one of 19 paintings from that date (14 shown). 16 works were registered in the fourteen days before. Paintings are dated by the day their batch was registered and photographed; each was finished that day or within the few days before. Phase: [P2 The Switch](https://peteryuill.art/phases/P2) (working title). Made after a calmer fortnight than 16 of the 17 dates before it. THE YEAR ## T_294 among all 402 Every painting of the year by date; this one is outlined. [Every painting from 2026.05.07](https://peteryuill.art/days/2026-05-07) · [This date in the year](https://peteryuill.art/year?follow=2026-05-07) ## Materials - **Paper:** [Red Star Mo She Special Effect Xieyi Edition, half-raw (June 2025 batch)](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S12), China Xuan Paper Co., Ltd., made 2025.06.07 - **Ink MB4:** [Yi De Ge Refined Ink Juice](https://peteryuill.art/inks/MB4), Yi De Ge (Beijing) - **Ink MB5:** [Boku-Undo Genso](https://peteryuill.art/inks/MB5), Boku-Undo - **Ink MB6:** [Yi De Ge Yun Tou Yan](https://peteryuill.art/inks/MB6), Yi De Ge (Beijing) The sheet of paper was made 334 days before this painting. When each paper was in use [S1](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S1)[S2](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S2)[S3](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S3)[S4](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S4)[S5](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S5)[S6](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S6)[S7](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S7)[S8](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S8)[S9](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S9)[S10](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S10)[S11](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S11)[S12](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S12)[S13](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S13)[S14](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S14) Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct ## Related From the same date · 13 Same paper and inks, other dates · 8 [Pattern V23 material and surface rung rose from 2026-05-24 on (rank-biserial +0.78, n 259)](https://peteryuill.art/oracle)[Pattern The floor of V23 Form rung raised in the later half of the practice (+2.30 SD, n 259)](https://peteryuill.art/oracle)[Pattern 45% of the variation in V23 Composition rung lies between batches (29 batches, n 259); with the month held constant 26%](https://peteryuill.art/oracle) [Previous T_293](https://peteryuill.art/works/T_293) [Back to all works](https://peteryuill.art/works) [Next T_302](https://peteryuill.art/works/T_302) ## Where next [T_276 same date, with 12 others](https://peteryuill.art/works/T_276)[T_302 the next shown painting in the sequence](https://peteryuill.art/works/T_302)[T_328 same paper and inks, 2026.06.03](https://peteryuill.art/works/T_328)[2026.05.07 19 paintings on this date](https://peteryuill.art/days/2026-05-07)[Paper S12 every work on it](https://peteryuill.art/papers/S12)