Homage: Mansions by the Sea

For the past few weeks I've been working on a series of night studies depicting urban scenes based on my many visits to Savannah, Georgia. The canvases are small (ranging in size from 9x12 to 12x16 inches) and have been quickly composed and executed. I'll present some images in future posts.

This work is a large canvas that I began in August 2010 and completed this month. It was to be the last large-scale piece I worked on prior to the ill-fated Somerhill Gallery show planned for October 2010. When I learned in August that the exhibit would be canceled, I ceased working on the painting, only to return to it immediately after the Christmas holiday.

The mansion depicted on the left was based on a photograph I found on the Internet; the one to the right is inspired from a famous work by an artist I admire. I decided to combine the two structures on an imagined bluff overlooking a sea. This work has been a struggle to produce and went through several iterations before I settled on this composition. In fact, I had painted in a different structure on the right only to paint it out a few weeks later.

"Homage: Mansions by the Sea." Oil on stretched canvas, 32 x 48 inches. Begun in August 2010; completed January 2011.