The Path Between City and Country

Posted by Tiff on Feb 21st, 2012 | 0 comments

Perhaps many people who’ve grown up in the suburbs, as I have, can appreciate the fascinating call of a big city.

The opportunities of the city drew me in early in life, yet after living there for a few years, the gentle beauty of more natural surroundings pulled me in the opposite direction. Now my path has lead me back to a more rural version of the suburbs in Los Angeles, in a satisfying place in between city and country.

This painting illustrates alot of the frustration I began to feel living in the city, where it felt dark, cramped and chaotic. Framed with stormy clouds, and lined with an entangled mess of highways that metaphorically seem to be going nowhere, the entrapment of the city exudes darkness, and even forebodes of death with the shadow of gravestones. Leading away from the city, a pair of figures follows the “yellow brick road” to a brightly lit doorway summit overlooking a completely different scenario. The arch of a rainbow welcomes them into the lush green vibrancy of nature, with its abundant sunshine, trees and waterfalls.

With this painting I pay homage to early Expressionism and Kandinsky’s vision of Moscow, in the way his bold colors and abstracted subjects communicate passion for the feeling of places.

Original for sale on Etsy, prints available soon.