FROM ASHMORE PARK TO WEDNESFIELD: THE JET BENCH

© The Artist

FROM ASHMORE PARK TO WEDNESFIELD: THE JET BENCH 1998

David Rayson (1966 – )

Details

Dimension
75 X 122 CM
Media
ACRYLIC ON BOARD
Accession number
P7131

Summary

David Rayson made a series of paintings of a canal walk from the Ashmore Park estate in Wolverhampton towards Wednesfield. These were painted from the memory of a very particular landscape: the hinterland of an industrial city in the West Midlands. The painting focuses on a well-used bench, which for some reason the artist remembered as a significant element in the scene. The dreary image of litter strewn pathways, neglected urban vegetation and industrial warehousing are filtered through memories of childhood and appear oddly sanitised, interpreted in a flat hyper-real style. Every detail is meticulously registered, every colour is distinct and clear – from the blades of grass and chewing gum wrappers in the foreground to the distant but entirely legible signage on the superstore warehouse in the background. There is a democracy in the degree of emphasis placed on each. There is no sense that any of these features represents a blot on the landscape – they each form part of it.

Landscape, The British Council 2000