In our last Kick-About, Saturnalia gave us licence for excess, reversal, and a bit of festive misrule. This week, we shift to something lighter and more playful: polka dot—a simple pattern often linked with luck, abundance, and new beginnings at this time of year. As always, the works that follow were made in a short time—and for all previous editions of The Kick-About, go here.
Gary Thorne
“A nice, simple prompt — the polka dot — so why not make things slightly more complicated visually? I have a series of four on the go exploring fragmentation, so KA-148 now makes number five. Hard to photograph at 3pm, with the last brushstroke having been made on 29 December. Painted in oil, 50 cm × 65 cm, which is as large as I dare go.”
Kerfe Roig
“I like the idea of dots bringing in the new year. I did both a grid and a mandala. 2026 is a Wheel of Fortune year, so very appropriate. May it turn us towards harmony.”
kblog.blog / methodtwomadness.wordpress.com
James Randall
“The humble polka dot. Funny how the simplest subjects can be so challenging. So, some doodlings. My first dotty outing was a reflection on recent events in Bondi — where we lived just across the street for ten years or so when Gez and I first met. It’s just a simple, obvious image that wanted to come out. The second is a figure between layers of dots. The third is a bit of pop. The fourth is a sun-and-planet-and-atom thing that didn’t really resolve. I hope you are all having a great festive jitterbug into 2026!“
Tom Beg
“I started with a single dot and with some duplicating, scaling, rotation and a few other tricks, things invariably ended up looking a bit cosmic and cool.”
Phil Gomm
“I was going to make some moving image thing in response to this fun prompt, but alas it wasn’t to be. Nonetheless, I was able to produce these images following the workflow I had in mind for the film. What I’ve ended up with are these vintage-looking images that look like stills from Fantasia maybe, or some other 1940s or 50s animation. They make me nostalgic for games of Tiddly-winks or those formative moments when I first discovered abstract animation on BBC2 at some unexpected time of day. Certainly, the colours suggest a party, balloons and the energy of a celebration. So, on that note, wishing you all a very happy new year!”
philgomm.com / behance.net/Phil_Gomm
Vanessa Clegg
“Well… polka dots. Little circles of silk are my contribution, with sidelight provided by my trusty torch. The other image was taken today, when I spotted this seed? feather? tadpole? on my window — blown by the wind and caught there, a small circle of life with the hills faint in the distance. Probably not that relevant to the prompt, but I wanted to share it with you all, as it was, for me, one of those out-of-the-blue moments when we notice something so tiny and inconsequential, yet also so beautiful, fragile, and temporary — a moment caught. Happy New Year, Kick-Abouts!“
vanessaclegg.co.uk / vanillaclegg
Graeme Daly
“It’s mad what you can notice in the mundane, especially when you have the Kick-About on the mind. I used a motorised Christmas lantern with a little Santa surrounded by liquid for my polka dots. The mechanism continuously moves tiny, twinkling confetti around Santa in his snow-globe-like lantern, so I simply let my phone sit on top of the glass frame and dialled the brightness down to film the dots as they glided about. These are mainly screenshots from what I recorded, but I’d like to continue tinkering with the filmed footage. The larger dots look more like something cellular growing in a Petri dish than something that’s supposed to be festive.“
@graemedalyart / vimeo.com/graemedaly / linkedin.com/in/graeme-daly / twitter.com/Graeme_Daly / gentlegiant.ie
Next time, our prompt turns to early blossom and the quiet promise of renewal.
Red's Kingdom 
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