Red Note on a Sea of Blues

2016

Acrylic and chalk on canvas panel

Signed bottom-right

Painting: 10 H x 8 H in

Frame: 17 H x 13 W x 2.5 in (43 H x 43 W x 6 cm)

Red Notes on a Sea of Blues is part of an ongoing body of work based on music notes. This series started several years ago when I began creating illustrations with music notes, and now I’m producing a series of paintings on the theme.

This is an 10″ x 8″ acrylic painting on canvas panel mounted on wooden board and framed in a hand-made, solid oak, shadow-box frame with UV-protecting Plexiglas. The frame was built by me and my dad many years before. The canvas panel is raised off of the wooden backing board to give it a floating effect. The framed work is 13″ x 17″ x 2.5″.

As the son of a carpenter I often use builder’s tools and materials in my work. During this period I was experimenting with using builder’s chalk lines on my canvases. The red horizontal lines were formed by snapping a red chalk line across the wet surface of the painting which had been coated in either a spray glue or acrylic medium. The red and gold note vibrates off the abstract blue background.

— Terry Smith, 28 Feb 2016

Update: Sold to a collector.