The Sweet Spot

The Sweet Spot,  80x80 acrylic on canvas framed in a heavy white box frame 93x93cm by artist Phillip Morrison.

This painting initially started out as an idea of the golfer with the trajectory of the swing to hit the ball being represented or visually reinforced with the colourful array of bubbles. Whilst I was in the middle of the painting, a friend who runs a pub across the road popped in and mentioned the golfer had a resemblance to Bryson Dechambeau, knowing very little about golf, I checked him out and yes I could see the likeness. I painted in his trade mark skull and crossbones on his cap to help reinforce the likeness. A couple of days later a couple I know for a long time who live in California came in and said that Bryson lived just down the road not far from them and that before he became a pro golfer he studied Physics at a high level. That spurred on the next part of the painting looking at Physics formulae for golfing, the mechanics and aerodynamics, it helps to look at the beautiful chaos of physics happening in the fraction of a millisecond when the club meets the ball. Capturing that dynamic energy on canvas means understanding exactly what makes a shot "sweet."

1. The Center of Percussion (The True "Sweet Spot")

2. Torque and the Moment of Inertia (MOI)

3. Kinetic Energy Transfer & The "Smash Factor"

4. The Double Pendulum Effect

5. Launch Angle and the Magnus Effect (The Flight)