ROUGH LANDING

2008

Acrylic on canvas 

82.5cm (w) x 55cm (d)     
Framed: 97.5cm (w) x 70cm (d)

Italian olive wood frame

One of the joys of owning such a painting is the continuing discoveries you make. The 18th Century fireplace resting here half buried in the sand dunes, defying the turbulent journey of immigrants in the mid-1800s – a relic of one of the many shipwrecks bringing colonists to Aotearoa – is just the beginning.

The thousands of individual grains of sand in their different shades of silvery grey feel silky under your feet; the shadowed undulating dunes and clumps of sturdy tussock grass lead your gaze around the beach to the water’s edge. Wind and water have shaped the driftwood into tangled, almost eerily lifelike forms. Beyond lie the stunning teal blues of sea and sky, their powers leashed for now.