Quick Trip to the Fort Worth Stockyard District

Fort Worth Stockyard District

Five times a second or so, in common moments, we freeze-frame the most plausible reality we can from what’s available.  Five times a second an electrical wave washes across our brain and we paint the foreground, mute the background, and thereby see, hear, taste, smell, feel the breeze on our skin.  Several times per heartbeat, over and over from birth to death, we each separate the specific from the general, the figure from the ground, and decide which shape is the mushroom (or the field mouse or the lost contact lens) and which is not.  We fit together the pieces that we can, and set aside the rest.

Ted Orland, The View From the Studio Door

Several friends over the years have recommended that I paint the New Isis Theater in north Fort Worth.  Late this afternoon, with temperatures hovering near the triple digits, I journeyed to the Fort Worth Stockyard District, and photographed the New Isis on North Main from several different angles.  But the time of day was wrong, and the entire theater was in shadow and low light.  So, I started shooting the commercial facades across the street as they sweltered in the setting sun.  I shot a number of photos of interesting ghost signs that I just may pursue soon.  But in the midst of it all, this single portal arrested my attention because of the brightness of the sun on it, the smoggy window pains, and the abuse I saw all over the surface of the door.

By the time I got back home, the hour was drawing late, and I felt the fatigue of the day pulling at me (I taught summer school this morning, 7:35-12:45).  I blocked out an 8 x 10″ picture plane and worked a little over an hour on this before stopping.  There is much refinement waiting to be done, but I have the basic washes in place, and even managed to drybrush some of the textures.  I’m looking forward to getting after the New Isis under good sun.  Perhaps tomorrow.

Thanks for reading.

I paint in order to remember.

I journal because I feel alone.

I blog to remind myself that I am not alone.

Tags: Stockyards