Bus Stop

David Park (1911-1960)
Bus Stop, 1952
oil on canvas
36 x 34 in.
Collection of Mary and Jim Patton, promised to the Ackland Art Museum
image: http://www.ackland.org/art/exhibitions/patton/park1.html

I discovered David Park today when doing research for a patron. She was looking to authenticate a painting she has that she believes is by David Park. I didn't recognize the artist's name, and happily I quickly discovered this wasn't an unknown mediocre artist (which is all too common in our reference inquiries).

The work I've chosen to share stands out from many of Park's other works which tend to focus on abstracted nude figures. I was drawn to the color palette in this work, the strong ochres, browns and oranges with happy swash of blue in the car bordering the right hand side of the painting.

"Most of his energy has gone into his feeling for the shifts in the inner space of an image and for the creation of light, which he can make sizzlingly bright or glowingly soft. A person’s eyes, in a Park, might be no more than dots. Yet the magic of his brushy and muscular paintings, often marked by hot reds, yellows, and oranges, is that the people in them have psychologically full presences, and we are pulled into the reflective spirit of the images." --"The Tender Art of David Park" by Sanford Schwartz