Sweet Avalon (SOLD)

fin

This is an oil wash "under painting"of the Avalon Fishing Pier in Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina. I used a red ochre to stain. This is the work in progress.

In the summer of 1989 the winds blew on shore for most of the month of July. Those odd summer winds brought the gulf stream right to the end of Avalon Pier. The floating grasses that typically define the edge of the gulf stream, that summer, defined the high water mark up and down the outer banks of North Carolina. That summer one lucky fisherman caught a sailfish on the pier. The sailfish is a member of the billfish family, blue marlin, white marlin, and sailfish and can be caught in the gulf stream 35 miles off shore. This was unheard of before, and not done since. I saw flying fish (the little ones with the wings) close to the end of the pier that summer. Again, not sighted since. I watched whales make bubble nets before they did movies about how whales formed spiral bubble nets. The owner of the pier had the sailfish mounted and displayed in a custom built glass cabinet on the front of the building. Over time, the fish faded in the afternoon sun, and it started to look tired. Not a good condition for a fiberglass fish. The owner eventually took it down and put it in the crawl space above the pier house.

"No surfing or swimming within 300 feet of the pier"

Oil on linen panel 12"X16"
this painting is sold.