And he is a very skillful guy. Out of Orlando, but he is really an old surfer dude from Santa Cruz. His publisher is throwing fragments from his documentary film “Heart of a Landscape Painter” up on YouTube. Like everything on YouTube, it looks pretty blocked up, but at least you get the general idea of what he is doing.
Here’s Peter Pettegrew out in the wilderness:
I wanted to do a painting of a Roser Park cityscape, so I biked down into the gulch Saturday morning. It wasn’t early, but there was no one in the park or on the street, not even a dog walker. Probably something to do with the gaspingly high humidity. Anyway, I managed to get some shots without much sweat. I have mastered the art of chewing each bite of air 40 times before inhaling, which makes breathing possible in this climate. Huzzah!
If you’d like to see the other 99 photos of Roser Park, go to the Flickr set.
Frankly, I had no idea that Robert Simone ever did a lousy painting; this piece appears to be a backhanded admission. So there may be hope for me yet.
The right time of day and atmospheric conditions can make anything look cool. The stretch of Central just north of Tropicana Field is kind of sparse and in need of infill to connect the Grand Central district with downtown St Pete, but at least it has a place to get drunk and a place to sleep it off.
I’ve always said: if it ain’t within walking distance of Euclid / St Paul’s neighborhood, my mutt and I can live without it. Okay, I’ve never said that. But I might say that in the future, if I forget my brain tonic.
This is Crescent Lake Park in St Pete, which is within walking distance of any place in Euclid/St Paul’s. Go ye and do likewise.
Booker Creek Park, which for all intents and purposes was useless until its 2007 revamp, sits behind (north) of Edward White Hospital, between 9th Ave N and 13th Ave N, just west of the 275 Freeway. Although it lacks mature trees and shade is sparse, it is a fine and underutilized lakeside park with observation piers, a playground close to 13th Ave N, and a .75 mile paved walking/jogging track. The roar of the freeway is tolerable on the West side of the park, which butts up against the site of a former (now empty and pleasant, but up for sale) trailer park. I find myself taking my little dog there more and more often, feeling he is probably safer there from from pitbull attacks than at Crescent Lake Park, although Booker Creek Park (not to be confused with “Brooker Creek” in North Pinellas County) does look like prime urban alligator habitat. Which is part of its charm, actually.
I love Yahoo Pipes feeds. They can bring you almost anything. This morning I ran across these three pics from among “found” photos which had been labeled by the photographer as being from St Petersburg Florida. Collector/Publisher vieilles_annonces claims to be “Simply A Girl From the Midwest of the US of A”, which is, of course, hardly the case. I mean, how many Simply Girls from the Midwest curate enormous collections of fascinating found photos? C’mon…
You should definitely check out her collection from Key West, 1958, too. Actually, so many of them are moving and beautiful– vieilles_annonces knows where to find them and what to share. Go see her collection. Do it now. For the vernacular in all of us.
(Above) Okay, I know where this is….
(Above) But where is this?
(Above) And where is this? Central Ave?
Edit: The consensus seems to be that the second two photos are probably not St Pete. Oh, well… there will be more… someday.
Why, you ask? Why do another damned view of the Coney Island Grill on MLK in St Petersburg? Well… the truth is that people like them. People want paintings of B-list landmarks of their hometown because they have pleasant memories about them, and it gives them a sense of place.
In a transient place like Florida, lack of a sense of place leads to carelessness about the local environment, both natural and man-made. Lack of a sense of place leads to bulldozers, stripmalls and apathy about local government.
I’d like to ascribe my tendency to rework local themes to a great concern about bio-regionalism, but really, I don’t use gasoline and I don’t get out much. What’re yuh gonna do?
Against a wall of flowers, no less. The photo-reference I used must be from last winter, because you sure aren’t going to catch anybody riding a bike in long pants in spring or summer on the Gulf coast of Florida. I am not hugely organized as regards my photo references, which adds mystery to the process, in the same way that not being able to find that crusty tube of alizarin crimson adds mystery. You know.
I am trying to keep up with my less-than-prolific output of artwork, which should be no problem, but I keep forgetting to bring the camera down to the gallery where I do a lot of work. This is a rework of a painting I did that sold some time ago; everybody liked it so much I thought I should try to do a looser interpretation. And like that.
It is 30×22, acrylic on paper.
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