Rio Housing

This is for the Virtual Paintout this month, which is visiting Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. I almost didn't make it this month, partly because of procrastination (see previous post), partly because of the holiday (Thanksgiving) - but mostly because I had a lot of trouble finding a location to paint.

There have been many beautiful scenes submitted for Rio, many of them beach & ocean. All beautiful sand, surf & people. Take a look over on the website - there is excellent work from many artists.

But, as I toured around Rio, I was struck not by the beaches (which we so often hear about), but by the poverty, slums and garbage that I saw within the streets. Once I started touring these sections, I knew that I would not be painting the beaches. There was just too much on the streets to notice - and "not" to notice.

There is ample graffiti written on stone walls and sides of buildings - there is garbage left accumulating in streets & on sidewalks. Vacant lots, vacant buildings. And what struck me most peculiar, is that as the google camera drove around capturing these sights - that the people of Rio were walking amongst it all, without a second look or seemingly without a thought. This was all matter-of-fact to these people -- and not so very far away from them are the beaches. With the sand, the sun, the fun and no doubt, the money. It really seems like such a stark contrast.

I looked around to find a colorful setting within these sad streets, and above is what I found on the corner of Rua Crato / Rua Venceslau Belo. There were others that I had found, and did a screen grab of. And it took a few days to finally decide on what I would paint. This location proved, at least to me, to be a harder challenge than some of the others. It was definitely an eye-opener as well.

Acrylic on 9x12 canvas