The Herald

2012

48" X 28"

Oil on Panel

In the collection of the Martha's Vineyard Hospital

This was meant to be included in last year’s show as part of the Laundry theme.

Like so many other paintings…
time robbed it of it’s planned debut then
but it turns out to be just fine.

I had originally sketched this with a full line of wash
and Pat standing behind the first row with a basket at her feet.

In the intervening year she has transformed Herself into the saucy svelte figure
that rivals her twenty something years and now that hard work
would be wasted if I painted her hiding behind a wall of sheets.

But it’s more than that.

As I grow into a more mature artist
I am much more focused on working to articulate and refine the “authentic self”.

Finding the simple truths that keep me on the edge of my seat as each new day unfolds.

Divining the depths of my studio mantra
Multum in Parvo
Much in Little.

And so, as this up island laundry line was revisited this spring
I began to pare it down.

To strip away the cluttered lines.

To soften the sky and shift the angle of the shadows.

The small companion painting, The Windwalker,
is a study of just the clothespin basket
snuggled into those impossibly deep blue shadows.

I was listening to Geraldine Brooks, The Year of Wonders when I painted that one
and absolutely loved the role of the healer
so that was where the feather
the Windwalker
came in to play.

As I painted that same basket in this larger work
the feather/healer reappeared
but this time in the form of the tiny bird
perched atop the roofline
throwing open her full throated song to the spirits.

Oh to be that honest.