Cotswolds Portrait – Original on Canvas 40×14
this is a new new thing … this is the first commission by someone out of the normal course of things out of the normal loop, someone removed from the sphere of influence; this is 3rd party art, word of mouth art.
this is cool art.
the cotswolds is one of those fantasy holiday areas; it is in the west of england, close to wales, it is full of quaint cottages and lakes and streams and rivers and rolling hills, often bucolic and certainly beautiful …
like the dready art itself though, this is a modern cottage.
i went to boarding school, for a time just beyond the cotswolds in the malvern hills … beautiful now, then in was the anathema of a little west indian yute … hate is probably too strong a word actually; I hated going, but once settled in, life at school was actually pretty cool, the malvern hills were full of adventure for boys and school was never arduous – good food, nice boys, sports, games, first in the bracken, walks in the hills …
i like the mallard entering the scene from the right, the boat at the shore … hidden in the picture is a dready chicken because I couldn’t find a suitable place for a touch of the west indies/caribbean; I’d thought of naming the boat in red yellow and green, but it didn’t fit nicely.
funny the things that go into a piece of art, we actually had a discussion about how the sunglasses were to sit on the father’s head … I liked them sitting on top, not over his eyes and someone suggested that this was more open, engaged; the process of getting to the end of a commission is very cool indeed.
walk good!