Original 18 x 24 Oil Painting
Signed Certificate of Authenticity
Hand framed in reclaimed wood
Ready to hang
Painted May 2019
The Morning Commute is from my really early Fauvist period and came straight out of my drive to work through eastern Vernon County. Amish buggies working their way through the rolling hills were a regular part of the morning, and I wanted to push the landscape rather than paint it politely.
The fields bend and sweep across the canvas in bands of orange, red, blue, green and ochre, while the road cuts diagonally through everything toward the little buggy. The perspective is exaggerated on purpose. The sky gets the same treatment - a huge mass of short blue, turquoise and pale strokes moving over the hills. Subtle it is not.
About four months after I painted it, I took it to my first ever art fair, the Driftless Area Art Festival. I had spent weeks preparing: bought a tent, built display furniture and stands, and generally behaved as though I was opening a branch of the Louvre in Soldiers Grove.
The first day I was nervous as hell. By day two I had settled down, made some sales, and sold quite a few prints of this painting - especially to kids who liked the color.
Late that afternoon a guy wandered into the booth with his hands clasped behind his back, inspected everything with the occasional "hmmph," and eventually told me some of the paintings were good, while pointing at this one and calling it "like paint-by-numbers."
I told him, "It's not paint-by-numbers. It's an impression of paint-by-numbers."
He gave me another "hmmph" and wandered off. First art fair. First critic. Job done.
Want a print instead? You can find prints of this piece here: The Morning Commute.
Original 18 x 24 Oil Painting
Signed Certificate of Authenticity
Hand framed in reclaimed wood
Ready to hang
Painted May 2019
The Morning Commute is from my really early Fauvist period and came straight out of my drive to work through eastern Vernon County. Amish buggies working their way through the rolling hills were a regular part of the morning, and I wanted to push the landscape rather than paint it politely.
The fields bend and sweep across the canvas in bands of orange, red, blue, green and ochre, while the road cuts diagonally through everything toward the little buggy. The perspective is exaggerated on purpose. The sky gets the same treatment - a huge mass of short blue, turquoise and pale strokes moving over the hills. Subtle it is not.
About four months after I painted it, I took it to my first ever art fair, the Driftless Area Art Festival. I had spent weeks preparing: bought a tent, built display furniture and stands, and generally behaved as though I was opening a branch of the Louvre in Soldiers Grove.
The first day I was nervous as hell. By day two I had settled down, made some sales, and sold quite a few prints of this painting - especially to kids who liked the color.
Late that afternoon a guy wandered into the booth with his hands clasped behind his back, inspected everything with the occasional "hmmph," and eventually told me some of the paintings were good, while pointing at this one and calling it "like paint-by-numbers."
I told him, "It's not paint-by-numbers. It's an impression of paint-by-numbers."
He gave me another "hmmph" and wandered off. First art fair. First critic. Job done.
Want a print instead? You can find prints of this piece here: The Morning Commute.