“Beached”

Painted en Plein Air in Salt Lake City

16×20”

oil on canvas

2026

This painting was a fun one. And I probably say that about all of them but I was really having fun with this one. I think that the subject is really interesting, a boat in Salt Lake City, left to rot in a back alley. There’s some sort of metaphor there to be drawn between the boat dry docked to rot and the Great Salt Lake drying up but I’ll leave that up to the viewer. 

Another fun aspect of plein air painting (French for outdoor) is meeting people while you're out in the field. This boat was in an alleyway in my neighborhood. And while painting this, this older gentleman came walking up behind me and he was carrying a golf club, and I’m not sure if his intention was to look menacing but I kind of think it was. Because then he started questioning me about what I was doing and I explained I was just painting. He told me I was on his property and that sometimes he has to kick homeless people out of here but if I was just painting then that would be ok and I could stay. I found it to be a pretty weird interaction because he could clearly see that I had my big easel and I was actively painting. Most people are so receptive and encouraging when I am out painting so it was pretty jarring to have this hostile interaction. But you never know what's going on in his life that made him react in that way so I guess you just have to chalk it up as sort of weird.

Anyways 99% of the time people are super encouraging and fun to talk to. I really liked the crisp lines of the boat and trying to get it’s perspective correct. I also love how the teal in the boat compliments the orange moss (lichen?) on the fence.