Seascapes — oil painting by Ray Patrick
Surf breaking over a shallow reef, with a low rock shelf across the middle distance and a band of green water beyond it.
Four horizontal registers — distant green water, the dark reef, the breaking white water, and the foreground sea. No horizon line and no sky to speak of; the picture is all water, read from above.
Chartreuse and olive in the far water, rust-brown on the exposed rock, and turquoise through aquamarine in the near sea. The foam is cream and pale lilac rather than white.
The foam is laid in thick dragged strokes with a drier brush so the colour beneath breaks through, and the ridges stand off the surface. The reef is two or three flat loaded strokes with no detail.
Oil on canvas board. Thickly painted, with impasto through the surf; the canvas weave is visible at the edges. Photographed resting on a sketchbook of ink drawings, which is beneath the work rather than part of it.
Lower left, raypatrick, in orange over the water, letters widely spaced.