RMW Ramblings

  Frenzy Frenzy looks up Broad Street in Philadelphia at the city hall.  The frenetic gulls echoing the evening commuter rush. The domed building on the left, now a hotel entry, was a series of banks which I remember as Girard Trust Corn Exchange.  

  Another Philadelphia View Water Works This little postcard-sized painting, Waterworks (acrylic on canvasboard), shows the old Fairmount Water Works along the Schuykill River in Philadelphia.  It was built in 1812-15 and operated until 1909. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairmount_Water_Works)  On the hill, Fair Mount, stands the Philadelphia Museum of Art (1928), referencing the classical revival architecture of the Water Works. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philadelphia_Museum_of_Art)

  Frenzy Frenzy , looking up Broad St in Philadelphia, utilizes several of my stylistic favorites.   A black ground, near-white rendering, and a dome.   I started with a view up Broad Street in Philadelphia with two iconic buildings, City Hall at the center, and the domed Girard Trust Building which is now the lobby of a hotel. It was designed by Frank Furness, one of my favorite architects. He designed the (Joseph R. Biden, Jr.) Wilmington Amtrak Station, the now demolished Wilmington B&O station, Recitation Hall at the University of Delaware - wrecked by major renovation - and several other local buildings.   Once underway with the painting I realized I needed something to move it beyond a boring static image.   I introduced the foreground soaring, scavenging gulls to embody the frenzy of a big city at evening rush hour.   The date and initialed signature is in a dot matrix format, symbolizing the frenzy of a countdown display, as when James Bond di...