A heterogeneous medium of constituents with vastly different mechanical
properties, whose inhomogeneities are in close proximity to each other, is
considered. The gradient of the solution to the corresponding problem exhibits
singular behavior (blow up) with respect to the distance between
inhomogeneities. This paper introduces a concise procedure for capturing the
leading term of gradient's asymptotics precisely. This procedure is based on a
thorough study of the system's energy. The developed methodology allows for
straightforward generalization to heterogeneous media with a nonlinear
constitutive description