In addition to my series of paintings depicting the Mid-Atlantic American farming countryside, I am also painting cityscapes. These depict buildings and places around where I live. This is an old practice of mine, that I used to do when I lived in Cambridge, Mass. I still have dozens of paintings of wooden architectural details, and whole houses and streets, that I did in ink and watercolor. Since I now have the prospect of showing at a gallery in my local area in Northern Virginia, I am reviving this practice and I hope to build up a small show's worth of images, at least a dozen.

I am not choosing conventionally "scenic" places or fancy houses, because these have already been done by many other artists. I choose the places that I find fascinating: commercial and industrial sites. This is where the geometry is strong and the textures are more interesting. I am very much influenced, in these ink and watercolor panels, by the watercolors of Edward Hopper and Charles Sheeler, who also painted images of the American urban-industrial world of their day. And before them was the group of American artists known as the "Ashcan School," who chose to create gritty scenes of poor neighborhoods and factories rather than slick portraits of overdressed society ladies and gilded interiors.

The city I live in, while it is historic, is neither quaint nor exceptionally beautiful. It is rapidly changing from a built-up suburb to a more concentrated area of higher-rise buildings. I have decided to highlight its commercial and industrial aspects rather than "charming" but generic architecture. This may not be conventional, but it will be different from the usual prettied-up images of leafy porches and garden gazebos. If the gallery-owner wants, I'd be happy to do a couple of that type of picture too. Remember, I am a commercial artist and have no problems with painting to a dictated style. Meanwhile, here is the first of my "ashcan school" series.

Sisler's Stoneworks is an old business in a section of town where there was once a quarry. Painting is ink and watercolor on illustration board, 9" x 11".

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