Late February Sun, Durst Barn 2022

20 x 25 in

acrylic on masonite

In this painting, I wanted to capture a specific moment in time, late afternoon sun at the end of February, streaming through a barn window. One of our barn cats, Charro, has taken advantage of the opportunity, and is soaking up the warmth of the sun and barn wall. This is a scene that has probably played out every year since the barn was built by Peter Durst, in 1874. I deliberately removed any modern narrative references, with the intent to take this specific moment and use it to illustrate something both universal and timeless. Cats seem to be hard wired to find comfortable resting places, whether it’s a barn cat in Southwest Ontario, or a Puma under a palm tree in the Osa Peninsula of Costa Rica.

The Covid pandemic has created a level of anxiety globally, on every social level down to the individual, and I feel it has forced people to find and/or create some increased measure of relative comfort in their lives. I know for me, painting has always been an escape route, allowing me to create my own reality. Both the painting of a cat seeking warmth and comfort, and the act of painting itself, are both in response to the various traumas of the pandemic, at least for me.

The specific time of year (the end of February), is also significant to me, made more resonant as a farmer whose life is tied inextricably to the daily march of the Sun across the sky. This is the week in the year when the fulcrum of the season flips between the passing of another Winter, and the promise of another Spring. I see this as a painting of hope.