An Old Homestead on 29 South

This painting is an oil and 30/30/30 medium on gessoed cotton duck canvas. I build it and prepared the surface w gesso. Gesso was developed in the 1950's as a mixture of titanium paint and rabbit skin glue to seal the surface so the oils done destroy the material of cotton over time. Earlier painters had to do mush more work to prepare a canvas for painting with more work of applying glue and a primer paint. Today its all in one. I tend to put three layers of gesso on to really seal the surface from any leaks over time. The painting here is one of a country dwelling that is now abandoned. It just off of Rt.29 which is a main north/south highway just above the town of Lovingston Va. Many homes are abandoned here in Central Virginia. I have had no problem finding them alongside the roads that twist through the back roads here in Central Virginia. I like painting them due to the fact that they are the history of those souls who once lived here and have moved on. They are the story of our South both black and white. The home are rotted wood, with designation as to the race of the families the lived within them. They are simply abandoned and rotting buildings falling apart day by day into dust (as the Bible puts it: 'ashes to ashes, dust to dust'). But not to get too deep, someone lived in them, and I like to remember the history of our land buy painting what remains. I hope your not too turned off by this 'dark side' of me.