08/2023 — 51″ x 26.5″
Acrylic on used fence pickets
$750
Once upon a time, Robert Tatum suggested I design an illustration around the concept of surfing on a texas beach. Cowboys on surfboards, maneuvering around off-shore oil rigs…stuff like that. What I came up with in Adobe Illustrator was pretty lackluster and unimpressive. Nothing became of my attempts, but the idea stuck around with me in my list of ideas.
One day in early 2023 as I was preparing for a show at FL!GHT Gallery, I revisited this theme and took a look at how we don’t really surf, we tube. And it isn’t just beached and off-shore rigs, but fresh water potentially polluted by fracking. I incorporated symbols of the Texas countryside and a tuber, shooting through polluted cloudy dull green water.
This piece is a bit of a departure for me as well, and an extra challenge, as the rig is such a dominate vertical feature that I decided to angle off to one side. Typically I am very symmetrical. The rig’s strong pull to one side had to be balanced through form and color to create a harmonic piece that didn’t fell like it was tipping to one side. I feel like I nailed it and it is a fun piece.
