House “Djibi”

House "Djibi" for the Friend of all Animals. (Oil on canvas-covered panel w/ aluminium coated ornamental frame, 40x53 cm)

House “Djibi” is named after the cat-novel by Felix Salten. Some cats, a dog, and other animals are living and dying and killing each other in the house of an elderly school teacher and his wife. The teacher is grappling with a mild identity crisis, being undecided whether he is too soft of heart, and wishing himself to be stern and unrelenting, before deciding that he is, indeed, a soft sort of man.

Before being assigned its final title, the painting had a working title referring to August Derleth’s house-centered novel “The Lurker at the Threshold”.

The painting tries to look rather encrusted as opposed to smooth. The clouds are trying to look like clouds painted by Walter Leistikow. Flake White Hue and Transparent White were heavily used. Some areas do look like details from Cuthbert Hamilton Ellis’ paintings: rough and unfinished impasto effects prevail in an otherwhise naturalistic but unacademic style.

The  painting is currently on exhibition in the venerable city of Cofbuokheim. The town remained insignificant until the 19th century, when coal mining and steel industry emerged. Now it shares its fate with beautiful Sheffield. The following is a paraphrase to the Sheffield city poem by Roger McGough:

When they closed the foundries/and the mills/You could have taken/to the hills/But you stayed

Might have given up the ghost/but instead/You took a deep breath/forged ahead/Bright as a blade

I like this place/my son a student here [remainder of the poem omitted]

© 2017 Torsten Slama and International Publications Organisation World Wide

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Tags: General Art, Painting, Torsten Slama