Commission for a Second Garage Painting
After a lovely article in Forecourt Trader about my winning painting 'Driving Home', which won 'The People's Choice Award' in The British Art Prize 2024, I received an email from another forecourt operator.
In the article Julie asked me if I “would take commissions for other forecourt operators, she laughed. “I don’t normally take commissions, but who knows?”
Andrew Hindmarch reached out pretty quickly after the Texaco garage article was published. After a couple of photos and email exchange another garage painting at night was born! This time I was going to paint his Gulf Garage, including a Spar shop in Stamford, Lincolnshire.
Andrew was really kind and helpful, sending over several photos from different angles and at different times of the day, a really good effort I have to say! Also invaluable reference material as I knew I wouldn't have the time to make the journey to Stamford myself.
A couple of the daytime photos captured my imagination from a compositional point of view. As a slightly different set-up to the Texaco garage I knew I had more buildings to include in this painting, but it was the silhouettes of the trees to the right of the garage (as you look at it) which caught my attention and solidified my composition. Using the rest of the photos and Google street level view I was able to fill in some gaps, and the night photos really helped me to understand the light sources.
I have to admit I made a couple of creative tweaks; the main aesthetic change was moving a lamp post; it would have been smack in the middle of the painting, so I moved it to the left hand side which helped to balance the composition.
In the article Andrew "...who has owned the forecourt for the past 35 years, is delighted with the result. He said that he plans to display the artwork, which cost him £400, in one of his offices. “I don’t think my wife will let me have it at home, despite the artist having done a lovely job,” he laughs. “I really liked what she had done with the other painting and thought it would be a nice thing for us to have as well.” Read the full article here.
I really enjoyed painting this commission, I wasn't sure I could re-create the magic again, but I'm really pleased with how it turned out.
