Wednesday, June 24, 2020

Butterflies


I recently completed a second painting of butterflies based on the same childhood memory as the first painting; the visit of a throng of butterflies of all kinds to the backyard of the small rental house on Fondren Street in Dallas around 1962.
This painting is in acrylic, painted on 3 canvas panels, each one 18 inches by 14 inches.  Technically it's a triptych, but I really had Japanese painted screens in mind.
I painted this on my kitchen table.


































The rent house on Fondren Street that belonged to Southern Methodist University where I had the butterfly experience about 58 years ago.  The house was demolished sometime in the early 1980s.  The lot remains vacant.  The houses on both sides still stand.

I looked to a number of artists for guidance and inspiration for this painting, but especially to an 18th century Japanese painter Maruyama Okyo.






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