This painting is a metaphor for all of the rural beauty that is being lost to urban sprawl. I used a palette knife to paint most of it and it was a demonstration for my Friday class but I finished it at home. Take the time to look and appreciate, the soon to be gone, farms, barns and fields, they are more than just quaint buildings; they are our past. They reflect the society we were before we became virtual and gadget oriented.
Past its’ Prime
This barn is past its prime
Red boards gone to gray with time
Voracious weeds starting their final feast
Vines and trees breaking the bones in its’ feet.
I stand along the road and paint
Its’ portrait like a red robed saint
Sadly out beyond the owner’s care
Its’ forgotten beauty a gift to share.
How many seasons have come and gone
How many more left in its song
A time gone now when roads were lined
With barns all red and in their prime.
I drove this lane a few months back
This once proud barn desperate; just a shack
Covered completely in tangles of green
More holes than not its fate now seen.
It was my pleasure to know this barn
But to pity the owners, lucky to see its charm
But it needs cows, pigs or sheep
To protect it from this ravenous creep.
Today our lives are bling galore
We consume our days always wanting more
But take that drive out to country lanes
Because soon all farms will have gone;
A shame.
Magnificent explosion of textures and movement that accurately reflect the rural spirit that is lost after having had better times