A courtyard creates a world within a world. It becomes a focus in itself and allows for activities to spill onto it and thrive. But is also a meeting point of the outside with the inside. Notions become more important than physical realities. The courtyard provides me this transitional space and is evocative of movement while being so central to the house.

 

I started to paint directly with gouache from photographs that I had taken. The paintings were done on a grid. It was almost a pixelation of the photograph. It allowed for abstraction of the image while retaining the atmosphere. I chose to weave it with twisted rayon and keeping the woven structure tied down throughout the fabric. I wanted to achieve a flat smooth surface referencing the whitewashed and painted areas of the house. I tried to break the repeat with heat-press flocking and printed plastisol in discreet areas. This also added pops of color that indicated people or movement. All this was done following the underlying grid.