Middlebury Apartment

This is an image of my apartment before I had begun to move in. I know that when I move into a new place I will disrupt the orderly fashion of things, so I like to document the simple peace of the place to remind me of what was here before. It’s a way to capture the simple calm I want to reclaim in my home.

I think the settings of Edward Hopper have hit a note in me that was and is really special. I still find echoes of his work in mine. I first became familiar with his work as a teenager. The feeling of empty space reminds me of Edward Hopper. I don’t actively seek to emulate the scenes, but midway through the process I find myself reminded of his work.

I had a great deal of trouble with the color of the floor in this piece. I started to use a transparent finish before I discovered it was glossy. I don’t like glossy. I painted over the gloss with a matte paint, but I lost the texture of the floor. So I repainted it with the glossy paint, inserting dark brown stripes underneath the gloss so the vague line could be seen. During this I remembered ink drawings and I wanted to start outlining the straight lines with ink. I have some nice repitograph pens that I used each with a different thickness.

To me, when you look at a painting, unless all the paint is uniform it stands out inappropriately. To compensate for this the light from the windows and the distant bathroom and the glass bulb are enhanced with the glossy paint.