A New Painting and a look at Rackstraw Downes

Casco Bay Ferry

Rackstraw Downes,
Farm Buildings
Near the Rio Grande:
West End of the
Barn, P.M.,

 The latest painting, "Casco Bay Ferry," took me in a different direction as far as painterly process.  I applied the paint in uniform blocks or dabs, with minimal gestures or lines, using a palette knife to flatten and coalesce adjoining dabs.  The over-all effect is an impressionistic one I am told, although I was not sure that was where it would end up.  It's something I'd like to try on a larger scale canvas with a freer palette, just to see.  On another note, Alex and I took in the Rackstraw Downes show at the Portland Museum of Art.  We both enjoyed the show immensely and found the works very accessible and remarkable.  Having spent a couple years in Kansas running on desolate roads there with a backdrop of dust, stone, scrub shrub, rusting equipment, lonesome structures and big sky, I felt particularly one with Mr. Downes paintings of the southwest like the one pictured above.  They offer a solitary man's view into these corners of our country that have their own character and aesthetic.