In the interzone

On the continent, Florianopolis, 12.5 x 16 cm, oil on card

Painting again in the interzone. A car`s place, Ballard`s place: drive in hotels and drive in take away restaurants: a solitary pedestrian, obviously poor, traipses along the side of the carriageway.

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Tomorrow I shall drive to the country.

Estrada Geral do Ribeirão da Ilha, Florianópolis; Brazillian architecture

Estrada Geral do Ribeirão da Ilha, Florianópolis, oil on card, 8.5 /10 cm  SOLD


 

Strip development along a highway: Brazilian architecture continues to astonish me in its sheer ugliness. You probably won't realise this if you look at books on Brazil because they are so selective.

You'll get even less of an idea if you look at books on this country's architecture, which will concentrate mainly on colonial stuff, the few remaining 19th century eclectic pieces, and showcase  buildings by Neimeyer and his pals.

Brazil's architecture is remarkable for it's general nastiness: ill planned, with no feeling for nature, nor sense of scale, with buildings constructed without consideration to their neighbours and no consideration to urban planning.

Moreover they are often very shoddily made. There are, naturally, one or two exceptions: a fancy art gallery here, a posh block there, maybe the odd grand private house: these serve to emphasise the mediocrity of the main.

I haven't come across any equivalent to the sort of simple, elegant mass housing seen in Scandinavian modern, or British Georgian.

The disdain for nature, surely Brazil's greatest asset, is amazing. There are almost no gardens or parks here worth speaking of, and those which survive from Burle Marx's day, say, are poorly maintained. Even large houses rarely have gardens.

With all this, I feel that I am stating the obvious, but the obvious sometimes needs to be stated. I sense an parallel to criticising Brasilian architecture in the position food critics found themselves when consuming food in Britain in the fifties.

Road-building I, Lagoa

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Road-building, Lagoa, oil on card, 13.5 / 12.5 cm - unavailable

A new suburban area being constructed where previously lay heathland.

Two Brazilians walk along the highway, a dog forages

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Two Brazilians walk along the highway: a dog forages, oil on card, 12.5 / 14.5 cm  SOLD

A rather Nordic- specifically Norwegian- style: the dog came in part homage to Frédéric Glorieux, a French painter with an affection for animals.

Today was heavy and close, refusing to rain: you feel tired and hopeless on such days, wishing the air would clear. I watched an excellent film called "The Road".

I must sort some kind of plan for Christmas.It will be dismal to rot here. Perhaps I can drive somewhere?

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Builders Yards near the turn-off to Santa Antonio

Builders Yards near the turn-off to Santa Antonio, oil on card, 13.5 x 11.5 cm

Painted from the car- a beautifully sunny day, almost too hot for comfort.

I also drove around Ratones, an interesting, quiet area which looks ideal for painting- the road winds and undulating, there are few tourists, horses graze.

Itaiópolis: a road trip

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Church near the junction for Rio Negrinho, oil on card, 12 x14.5 cm   SOLD

I feel that my trip was a sucess, I painted six pictures, five of which are presentable, not a bad catch.

Itaiópolis itself is quite interesting, a city in two distinct parts, the old town with some good architecture from the turn of the century and the Polish church (the interior most beautifully painted), and the newer part which is less interesting but where most of the services are.

Driving around is very nice: I was delighted with the quality of the roads, and how pleasant the views are: the landscape undulates very beautifully between the sea and Itaiópolis, the little houses sitting so very gracefully among trees and hills.

 

A view north from Itaiópolis, oil on card, 12 x 9.8 cm  - available

Shanty town near Rio Negrinho, oil on card, 9.8 x 13.9 cm  discarded

A section of BR101, oil on card, 8.6 x 12 cm

There is a certain sky effect which I have started using and which I must be careful not to let become a cliche.

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Highway overpass

Highway overpass, oil on card, 11.2 x 9.7 cm - available

Another painting of the highway, which is probably the finest modern construction here on the island- though given the level of design here that is hardly a great accolade.

I am looking forward to buying a car in August and exploring more thoroughly the inter-urban landscape.

The Highway- a photographic series

Highway located near CIC, Florianopolis

The highways are probably the finest pieces of architecture in modern Florianopolis.

Painting is not the best way to represent them- at least, not the sort of paintintg I do, which is much to equivocating, too muddy.

My camera, a Lumix DMC TZ5 is an excellent small camera, but has certain limitations- extreme contrasts of light and dark, and extreme colouristic contrasts cause it to lose detail or to distort colour. The zoom lens is excellent, but it cannot be changed.

Elevated Highway; Inter-urban painting

Elevated highway, oil on card, 12.5 x 10.2 cm; 54 US$ or equivalent - removed

One of a series of paintings which will feature the roads and suburban architecture that is a response to, and product of Florianopolis's intensive car culture (car ownership for the city runs at 50% per capita, an incredible number given the cost of cars relative to income in Brasil, and when you consider that this includes children and people incapable of driving).

The phenomenon of this interurban architecture is excellently considered in "Italy - Cross Sections of a Country," Scalo Zurich, 1998) by Stefano Boeri, which charts his work with the photographer Gabriele Basilico, describing the urban sprawl along various Italian highways, and with it the destruction of 19^th century city spaces and lifestyles.

This terrain has also been visited by painters before, most obviously Edward Hopper, and there are various other American artists who've dealt with this sort of landscape, including photo-realists.

Painting such scenes is not pleasant as it requires spending time in settings which are inhumane, good only for cars, often noisy and polluted. And a major reason for many painters for being painters is romantic rebellion: a pastoral retreat into the countryside, an escape from this suburbanity. I have those romantic tendencies myself. This world of parking lots and highways and shopping malls and storage lots, all interconnected by tarmac is disturbing, apparently centreless: the world of J. G. Ballard.

Highway

The endlessness of traffic.