33 to go

This painting started out based on the third thumbnail from left, top row, on the sheet of 35 but it stayed on my easel in the oil-wash foundation stage for days because the composition made me wince each time I looked at it. When I went back to work on this piece, I thought about how much my hometown has changed since I lived there and what it is that still binds me to the area. One fondness is the sound of the train whistle of my childhood that I heard again as I was shooting the reference photos for this series. I kept that sound in my mind as I painted this one, "Hometown Heartstrings," 14 x 14 inches, pastel on paper.