Redtree Times

This is another painting from the Exiles series, called The Deacon’s New Tie, a piece finished near the end of the series.  It is a bit lighter and more whimsical than the other pieces in the earlier post.  He has hung in my studio for many years now and is a fine companion.  

There’s really no back story to the Deacon.  He sort of just emerged from the surface.  I had no preconception of what he would be when I started.  I remember clearly starting this piece on a blank sheet and making a nose.  Slowly, the face formed and when his eyes with their hangdog look came around I knew he was different than my other Exile characters.

The funny thing about the Deacon is that several months after the piece was done and include in the Exiles show, I came across an article in the newspaper about a 95 year-old man in central Florida who had won a case where he was trying to be forced from the land he had lived on for nearly 70 years.  There was a picture of a  bald old man sitting on his veranda, a slight smile on his lips.  There was something slightly familiar in that face, something that caused me take a second look. There it was: he was the spitting image of my deacon.

Then, reading the article, it stated that he was a longtime member of a local church and was known to friends and neighbors as the Deacon!

So, perhaps this is a portrait,  of sorts.  Either way, have a great Christmas, Deacon.   Maybe you’ll get a new tie this year- you’ve been wearing that one for about 13 years now.