Doorway
76 x 122 cms 2009
$17000 Sold
The staircase was amongst the many photos I have taken of the Melbourne
Lanes, but there was a bright red door in its doorway and a steel
handrail on the wall. The pink light was, in fact, a white neon light
painted pink and had a lot of graffiti on it. The wall beside the stairs
was a more yellowish cream, but there was no way that was ever going to
work properly with the rest of the composition.
The door at the top of the stairs was from another photo, opened into a
lane and had a lot more graffiti and pink posters on it. I intended to
add all the graffiti, and the three pink posters, but the posters made
it appear too far forward and, having left it alone for the paint to dry
after doing the 'exit keep clear', never felt the need to add extra
fiddly bits.
The barred window was from another lane and I've painted it as if it was
boarded over, though it was, in fact, dirty glass, but there was so much
grey by then that I didn't have the courage to add any more.
The wall, from yet another building, was painted grey all over and,
having a window rather than a doorway, didn't have much of a lintel but
I wanted a strong rectangular shape at the top of the composition, to
force the weight of the building down onto the dog, trapped between the
yellow lines (yes, I know there aren't any yellow lines in the lanes).
The colour of the lintel was added later to each side of the doorway to
strengthen it.
The green graffiti was, in fact, magenta which wrecked the whole colour
balance for a long time until I thought, duh, this doesn't HAVE to be
magenta! The posters on the left were there, but the skull and 3
faces were from somewhere else, as were the two women tucked away in the
angle of the back wall (which wasn't stepped back in the original
either).
The kerb, roadway and red graffiti came from yet other lanes, but the
CHEZ graffiti came from a series of five concrete header tanks up above
Port Augusta
**There are more notes on the dog on the Compare Use of Dog Page.
 |
 |
 |
