Madonna of the Streets
This painting was a very large painting, almost six feet wide and about four feet deep. The woman that hired me to do this was very wealthy and she wanted it for her home. She wanted an abstract with an Indian motif, so I painted a street woman in India smoking a cigarette and then I abstracted it with all this other stuff around it. I don't do many abstracts so this was my take on it, trying to blend the reality and the abstract.
Central to the composition is the image of a street woman in India, emanating an air of mysterious allure as she smokes her cigarette. This figure gives a glimpse into the captivating everyday life of the subcontinent, at the same time becoming the anchor for the transformative metamorphosis of the canvas. The surreal background takes viewers on a visual journey through my imagination, where the real and the abstract intertwine harmoniously.
When the painting was shown to the woman who had commissioned it, she liked the way it came out. I'm glad I could capture the essence of her desires, and the painting found its rightful place as the centerpiece of her exquisite home.