How to Ruin a Prairie
20 January 2023
Acrylic on canvas
16 x 20 inches (41 x 51 cm)
The constant (so it seems) erection of apartments in my surrounding area consume grassy areas at an astonishing rate. The building in the painting doesn't look much like an apartment building but it's ugly and dark. I know apartments give people a place to live, but they too, are ugly. The building is anything you want it to be - an apartment, a factory, something sitting on dirt. The clouds were done primarily with palette knives which was something I wanted to practice. I was pleased with the results.
This painting started with a repurposed canvas. We'll call it Fence Flowers. Because I have a lot of unused red paint, I made an initial coat with red and a bit of white.
I kind of liked the red, ominous sky so I threw in some more white and yellow and stayed with it. Next I added some buildings. I thought they were a bit cartoony so I kept modifying them. The buildings ended up being the most frustrating part for me. I like that I've started taking pictures of a painting's progress, but one thing that comes with it is potential regret. For instance, part of me wishes I would have stuck with these smaller, gray buildings.
As you can see, the buildings continued to get modified. And as mentioned above, I think I liked the buildings on the right at least as much as the final building. The red (left) or brown buildings did a good job conveying the ugliness of the structure. It occurred to me that dark buildings and a dark sky might not emphasize the impact of the building as much as I was looking for. You can see my initial attempts to brighten the sky.
I finally settled on a single, larger building and gave the scene a brighter day. The brighter sky and more pristine prairie gave the building a better contrast - which was the point. Also, I wanted to let go of some rigidity/realism (personal objective) and make the clouds primarily using palette knives. It's fun to 'let go' and experiment with other methods. It's even better when I like the results.
This painting is in a frame very similar to this one.
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