Description
With “Catcher in the Eye,” I wanted to step completely outside my familiar valley landscapes and explore a foreign streetscape purely through my imagination. Having never been to London myself, this painting is my personal, dreamlike projection of its historic streets, mixed with a playful spin-off of the literary classic, The Catcher in the Rye.
The composition pulls you down a rain-slicked street where shady, mysterious figures drift through the dim light, including a character watching from an upper balcony on the right. Far in the distance, a stylized Big Ben looms against an electric blue sky, wrapped in bright neon purple and green.
This canvas marks a big shift in my studio process because I used a very minimal amount of paint here. I stripped down my usual thick layers to let the raw brushwork and flat washes speak for themselves. I wasn’t quite sure why I stopped where I did in the moment, but the canvas simply told me it was done. This 36″ x 36″ piece also serves as an early layout page for my book project, capturing the moment a confrontational dog pack sends Wackadoodle walking out of town.