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Saturday, November 6, 2010

Little Girl, Big Painting

The germ for my largest painting to date was an entirely invented figure of a little girl dancing:


Even photographs of people dancing don't always capture the feeling and the rhythm; one has to fake it.  This is where the limitations involved with working only from motion picture frames shows up.

Religious artists have to invent convincing drawings of angels flying or supernatural individuals ascending to heaven.  Myths often require drawing things which couldn't be observed in real life.  Here is an elaborate example:




So I invented a dancing child who conveys the infectious rhythm and abandon of jazz music

Vanderbilt University bought the painted study I made of her; it hangs in the collection of the
Black Cultural Center in the Gillette House:



I built up the rest of the picture around the dancer, furnishing it with a jazz band, some spectators beginning to gather, and more anecdotal incidentals than I would include today: boys running, a dog, baby buggy.

The whole scene was set in the dappled shade of an oak tree in order to further agitate the surface and liven the composition.



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