53rd Street – Hyde Park by Meredith Dytch
I paint the city, choosing scenes that are informed by my belief that
there is beauty to be found in many places that aren’t normally
thought of as having aesthetic value. Abandoned buildings, rusting
viaducts, overgrown vacant lots and trash-filled alleys present their
own authentic face to the world – we just don’t usually see them as
places worth paying much attention to. Our eye skips over them as we
flash by in our cars or trains.
I had been painting overpasses and alleys for several years when I
came across the work of British-born, Yale-educated artist Rackstraw
Downes. In his insistence on finding aesthetic value in the most
mundane scenes, his sensitivity to the precise placement of line and
form, and his willingness to de-glamourize the art of landscape
painting, I felt a kindred spirit. I had been struggling for some time to
articulate just why I was attracted to painting the particular scenes
that I did. As I read his essays and interviews I found many
commonalities, and came to a deeper understanding of my own
interests and motivations.
I am not interested in idealizing or glorifying what I see, just in
capturing the essence. I believe that the world around us does not
need to be idealized – that there is beauty in the unadorned honesty of
crumbling concrete, rusting metal, peeling paint and scaling brick.
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