The Last Dory

This artwork was created in 2024.

The framed dimensions are 33 x 43 in.

ARTIST STATEMENT

The psychology of shape is everywhere we go. The word shape goes far beyond just
defining the external form of something. It is metaphorical. Who hasn’t contemplated
the ‘shape of things to come’. An artist would be lost without an appreciation of the
use of shape - not only in composing a painting, but in understanding observed
reality. Recently I made a trip to Brier Island to isolate myself among fishing
structures that inherently display commanding shapes that have endured. The
minimal shape of a shed interceding with the exuberance of a once great fishing age,
brings out our understanding of utilitarian beauty - architecture beautifully realized. I
encountered long rectangular shapes projected over water, interacting squares and
diagonals configured together to make up a community of fishermen, shapes that are
both abstract and figurative. Shapes lingering with the patina of the past taking me
into the world of industrial archeology, and others clad with new materials of today,
evidence of the modernist shift to a more neutral identity. Living close to fishing
communities over the years has lent me an appreciation of the enduring shape of
sheds, a subject that has prefigured in my work as far back as 1990.

Steven Rhude, Wolfville, NS 2024