Member-only story
“Everglades Retreat”
Day 147 of my artwork retrospective
This alkyd painting could be the only house commission I have ever done. Not a great photo, but as it’s from 1985, it’s all I have. As it was varnished before I took the photo, that meant a lot of glare due to the shiny surface. So Photoshop had to be employed to remove the shine as much as possible and tweak the colors back to where I remember them.
Sue, my fellow bellydance troupe member, commissioned this for her parents. This “retreat” was way down south and west of Miami, sort of in the Everglades and sort of in the Big Cypress National Preserve. In other words, I don’t know exactly where it was other than “way out there.” Which is how Sue’s parents liked it. Possibly it was on Loop Road, which was back then not much more than a lumpy old gravel single-lane track that both began and ended on Tamiami Trail. One of those odd Florida brainstorms which didn’t quite work out for the developer.
As it was a surprise for them, all I had was a single reference photo that she had smuggled out of her parents’ house. This put me at a great disadvantage, but I did what I could, and she reported they were happy with the result. I particularly enjoyed painting the reddish trunks of the gumbo-limbo trees out front.
What caused Sue to commission this “house portrait” was the unhappy news that the federal…
