Dappled brushwork, delicate hues and cloisonné textures dance across the surfaces of Cranston's still lives, landscapes and interiors

Scottish painter Andrew Cranston (born 1969) creates transporting images that destabilize our sense of time: they invite the viewer to explore a space between nostalgia and the realm of the dream. Dense blots of oil graze on top of washes of distemper, guiding the viewer's eye through thick and thin layers of pigment. The paintings gathered in Waiting for the Bell conjure a state of liminality--the feeling of being suspended in a dream before the alarm jolts one back to reality--and draw from stories, poems and experiences that emerge from the artist's subconscious. Each painting's layering is guided by intuition: a reference to a Carole King album cover is interlaced alongside allusions to jazz history, the writing of Muriel Spark and visions of the Scottish coast.

This substantial volume includes newly commissioned essays by Stephanie Burt and Barry Schwabsky.