SECRET STAIRWAY

60" x 48"
Acrylic on Canvas

When I was 10 years old my family lived in a 200 year old home on four acres of land. There was a bocce court my father iced over in winter for skating, a lush pear tree, and blackberry bushes everywhere.

I started by mapping out the land and the house on the canvas to reconnect myself with that feeling of being there, then painted over it, purposely blurring it out like a memory, leaving only the staircase. Those stairs were always the focus — I loved them and wanted the whole painting to be about them. They were so narrow and steep that climbing them felt like being transported back in time. I drew them the way a child would, because I was a child when I knew them.

Built up with brushes and a silicone catalyst wedge, the painting holds that same magical quality the house always had for me.