Moon River

I finished "Moon River" this week. It is the first time I have done a painting on a square canvas. I am  oriented toward horizontal rectangles, so it was interesting composing on a square. I decided to  work off the symmetry and  put the vanishing point in the center of the canvas, creating a kind of vortex around which to compose. The river recedes beyond the vanishing point and the other diagonals in the interior recede to two other vanishing points on the same horizon line outside of the picture plane. The song "Moon River" has many associations for me. The earliest is of my mother playing it on the piano when I was a small girl. As I got older I came to imagine that as she played it, she dreamed about a more romantic period of her life, when she didn't have four little kids running around her. I loved to sit next to her and watch her face, while she played, with her eyes softly closed.  I can remember reading the title and lyrics over and over again. I was always mystified by the words "Dream maker, you heartbreaker, wherever you're going I'm going your way." "Moon River" is oil on linen, 48" x 48"