Landscapes, Desert — oil painting by Ray Patrick
A small oil of broken cloud over a dark desert ridge, the land running in bands of rust and umber to the bottom edge, lying in its shipping box.
The sky takes the upper half and the land the lower, divided by a level ridge line. The cloud is stacked in flat masses and the ground beneath is read as parallel bands of colour with no incident in them.
Cobalt breaking through cloud in bone, pewter and lilac. The land runs oxblood, rust, olive and umber — warm throughout, and set directly against the cold sky.
Heavy impasto, the cloud laid in square-ended strokes stacked rather than modelled and the ground dragged in long horizontal pulls, with the paint standing well off the surface.
Oil on canvas paper with an unpainted margin, in a card box. A studio photograph of a work ready to ship.
Right edge, raypatrick, scratched into the wet paint.