The commute from home to my Ballard studio takes me over Phinney Ridge and I often stop to photograph the houses along the way. If you live on Phinney Ridge it’s possible that some day you’ll find your home in one of my paintings.
Sometimes the houses that interest me are those that I can't really see, the ones hidden from sight behind bushes and trees. It’s intriguing to consider why people choose the landscaping that they do. The house pictured above happens to be near a very busy intersection where two roads pass by it on either side at 90-degree angles and converge just north of the property line. Consequently, the house doesn’t have much of a front or back yard but the skillful placement of trees and bushes hides it from the view of passing motorists like me. That seems right.
Here is another home that has appeared in a number of my paintings. The practical side of me wants to remove the trees to clear my view but they are lovely and have a Bonsai-like quality that's a bit irresistible. Yet, they seem misplaced in front of this house because they are too large for the space. I find myself straining to see what is beyond. I want to see the multi-layered structure with its peeks and valley, it's windows and doors. I want to see what makes up this home.
Home Symbols #5, which is the painting below, is one of the paintings inspired by this house. As you can see, I've simplified the structure and adjusted the landscaping until it somehow seems right. The original trees are waiting for another painting.
Maybe I should have become a structural engineer or landscape architect, but a lack of mathematical aptitude put the kibosh on that idea. When I was a child I used discarded 2x4s to lie out floor plans on the grass where my sisters and I would play house. I spent hours shifting boards around in an effort to create the perfect space. All these years later it occurs to me that I'm really doing the same thing with paint.
The urge to build a three-dimensional structure has recently been nagging at me and I’ve made a few mock-ups of the monolith that has appeared in a number of my paintings. It’s too soon in the process to know what will happen with those models, but the process is great, messy fun. Landscaping will be an issue to consider. How much will be revealed. How much will be concealed. In the end it has to have a sense of home, a metaphoric habitable space. Something that seems right.
I love the reveals memory sometimes blesses us with that, in hindsight, were such a clear indication of a fulfilling path... thanks for sharing.
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