Winter in New York 2015

Pietropoli Patrick made this atmospheric vision of New York with oil on canvas. I can almost feel the cold in this piece! The artist has conjured up a busy city scene, but it’s one which feels hushed and still because of the restricted palette of greys and whites. The yellow cabs punctuate the scene like little bursts of hope. There’s so much blurring, smudging, and scraping; I imagine Patrick building up the image only to wipe away areas to give a sense of the city being worn away by the weather. It makes me think about that constant battle artists have: to make and then destroy in order to find a picture. The three-panel structure of this work feels like a storyboard and suggests the passing of time. That smudge of white in the middle panel gives the impression of steam rising up from below the city. Patrick, like all painters, is speaking to other artists, sharing insights, and maybe even answering questions that another painter posed years ago!