These are plein air oil paintings, painted on site. My goal is to paint an environment or neighborhood rather than a single place. A location, activities and people, lighting the time of day, the fun of recognition are a goal to render. Altho they are literal paintings they are realistic only to a point. Eventually I leave off and paint the paint itself having its own abstract personality. I'm drawn to complicated places; lots of textures and divisions of space. A tumble of cars and equipment, electric poles and lines, empty trees against the sky. Shapes of buildings broken by shadow, parts hidden by other things barely determined. Ambiguity is embraced. It isn't always important to know what I am looking at but to paint what I see even if I don't know what it is. I do seek out some confusion when I select a site as it usually makes the most interesting painting for me to try and sort out.

-carlye crisler