White truck (2024)

White truck is the completion of my first triptych.

In 2004 I created Red Truck. Eleven years later (2015)
I created Blue Truck. For years my wife, Zosia, kept telling me I should do one more and make it a triptych. I thought about it and felt a white truck would be a good addition. Hanging the three trucks together would add a touch of patriotism—Red, White and Blue.

I kept my eyes opened for a good candidate. Looking around parking lots every time I parked somewhere but nothing was hitting me. I then remembered many years ago going to visit my friend Chip who has a few thousand acres up in Northern California. On the property he has a junkyard filled with dozens of old cars and trucks. In that collection was an old cement truck he used when he had a construction business. I asked Chip to take a few pictures of the front of the truck and text them to me so I could get an idea of what I needed to work with.

The actual truck was in far worse condition than the way I rendered it. Because of the complexity of the subject, I tossed and turned and continued to avoid starting the project. I kept searching for something to inspire me to paint it. My wife kept saying “white truck” every time I complained that I wasn’t being drawn to anything.

Finally, I decided to tackle the task of creating this beat up old truck. My wife’s insistence had a lot to do with it, so I did a dedication to her where some numbers appear on the headlights (seen at bottom right).

The creation of the truck was far more interesting than I had previously thought. The damages brought on by years of sitting motionless in the California sun were quite complex. This led to a massive amount of good old “hand and brush” techniques. It wasn’t a case of simply creating a shape with the Pen tool and filling it with a color. Every smear of dirt, crack in the paint and dribble of rust had to be created using specially designed brush tips and stroking away on the canvas by hand.

As I completed each section the excitement grew! It was coming together and capturing the essence of the rusty old truck. I will admit, it is not something most people will want to hang on the wall over their couch but that has never been my criteria for painting any of my images. It is the challenge of recreating reality far more detailed than a camera can capture.