Not Just a Landscape

On my recent visit to California,just last week, I got to hang out with my good friend and amazing artist Stephen Workman, and we went to a few galleries in town to see what the current San Francisco art scene is up to.

As we went about our business we walked past one of the schools of art, which was having an exhibition on landscape paintings from one of their program's faculty. The artist is a self-proclaimed landscape artist, so she basically ONLY paints landscapes. Which brought us to talking about how we felt about landscape painting.

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 In reality, I haven't really defined what I would like to paint. I simply like to paint according to what inspires me at the moment. Sometimes its nature, sometimes people, imaginary scenes, geometric shapes.... and at times, it has been landscapes and cityscapes.
The thing is, once i thought about it, I realized wasn't just painting a view or a building, when I paint a landscape, I'm painting a feeling, or the memories that are brought up by seeing the surroundings I was in at the time. It doesn't represent any sort of affiliation or support for something, just the general feel I get from being at some place, or having been there.

The Salt Lake City Temple paintings I have do remind me of good times and great people from there. I had really great friends and despite it being a much slower pace than what I enjoy now, living in NYC, it was a great lifestyle for the time I was living. A lot of people ask me if I'm mormon because of having lived there and seeing that I have those paintings, and I'm not, but most my friends there were, and they are all great. The temple is beautiful and it does bring nice memories.

Same goes for the painting below. Miami is one of my favorite places to visit, I love the city, the weather, the vibe, but most of all, I mostly visit it with my family, so its a place full of memories with them. One thing i never considered when painting it though, was that I could do the same service for other people, such as the person who wound up buying this piece from me. I know he likes Miami a lot, and he visits quite often, and as he said (and i'm paraphrasing) "now I have the Miami views that I wanted". So to think that every time he sees the painting in his home, would make the connection for him with the place that he loves so much, gives me a great deal of satisfaction.

So maybe there is more to painting landscapes, and we can all see them for more than what they seem to be ;)

Post by Daevid Mendivil's Art.