SOS for the World

Acrylic on canvas

This is one of the Bridgwater Circle series of paintings image captured while walking home. Just the other side of the Broadway from Blake gardens under the underpass and up by the side of the river in Bridgwater, Somerset.

Under the old plane trees on the bank of the river Parrot stands a life ring. On this particular summer day, with the sun down low, it lit up this red container and cast leaf shadows across its face. A dramatic vision in red with an azure blue-sky backdrop. Inspired to paint this, as I did, I realised that the central circular white information label ‘In case of emergency’ due to the way the shadows fell, looked very like the earth and our continents. I thought how much the SOS of a life ring resonated with the place we are at, with the damage we are inflicting. Planet earth needs rescue and it’s an emergency!

Original photograph taken 22 ‎October ‎2018, ‏‎17:22:35