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.

Tree and billboard, Corrego Grande

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Tree and billboard, Corrego Grande, oil on card, 11 x 8.5 cm  - available

Another painting looking at the modern landscape: I don't especially like it, but it is interesting.

A friend of mine lives in Trindade in an apartment overlooking the bus station and highway: Ballardian at night, and very alienating. I think I will ask him if I can come and paint it one evening.

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.

Slip road near a technological park, Ingleses

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Slip road near a technological park, oil on card, 9.4 x 6.8cm  - available

Another painting of a road. One way artists avoid ennui and deal with their fear of repetition is to create series, so that the lack of dissimilarity between works is a point of interest, not of boredom.

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Sadness is a filling station in Brasil

Sadness is a filling station in Brazil, oil on card, 9.4 x 7.3 cm  SOLD

Tomorrow I shall be back at the sea, weather permitting.

Urban landscape with water pipes

Urban landscape with water pipes, oil on card, 9.5 x 13.9 cm

There isn't much post-industrial landscape here- a pity as it is very interesting to paint.

View from a business park, Florianopolis

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View from a business park, Florianopolis, oil on card, 12.9 x 10.2cm  - available

Here is another picture describing the suburban, or car-based landscape, which I shall be concentrating on over the next few days.

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Highway bridge over the creek

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Highway bridge over the creek, oil on card, 11 x 8 cm - available

In the background you can perhaps make out Florianopolis' central hill with it's broadcasting installations. Favela construction, vomit-like, is starting to speckle the hill.

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.

Two paintings from Estreito

lOverpass, oil on card, 12.5 x 10 cm

Estreito, Street, oil on card, 10.8 x 10 cm

Two new paintings. For the first time I drove over to the continent to see what I could find for subject matter. It's great to visit unfamiliar neighbourhoods: it's refreshing. I didn't realise how tired I'd got of the familiar streets near my house.

The picture of the overpass was painted first. The second is a response to the confusion of Brazilian streets, with their incredible jumble of telegraph posts, signs, wires and buildings of all sizes and shapes. I shall do a few more like this: they are great fun to paint, and show one that there is a sort of beauty to be found in the visual chaos. It's nice to work very fast and not to fuss with corrections so the effect is lively and fun and fresh.

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.