I paint emotion, My realism oil paintings need to drip with emotion. I can not paint anything else. When I first saw Sarah I was hit by this overwhelming sadness. Sarah was a young homeless lady clearly in pain, she was sat down outside South Kensington Tube Station and being shouted at and told to move by a security guard. She tried to get up but her legs were in such a bad way that she struggled to do so. I met Sarah in 2019 and I got to know her over a seven day period and as I sketched her I got to understand her story. As with many of the homeless she had suffered abuse as a child and had found the streets of London as an escape. She was suffering with both physical and mental trauma, her legs had been badly burned and she had tried to protect the burns with makeshift bandages.
Sarah was so hopeful, so calm and such a beautiful person. I wanted the painting to be a painting of contradictions. I called it The Yellow Road as a reference to the Wizard of Oz. In the class society that we live in the road to riches is open to a select few and the other road that most people have to take is a road that is lonely and hard, our very own yellow brick road.
I painted Sarah with real care, every inch of her told a story, her eyes glistened with both hope and despair. I had to use the smallest of brushes to create this detail and as with all my hyperrealism artworks I could not compromise on the detail. The background was vast swathes of colour that would push the viewer to really address the emotion of the subject.
I want this painting to be about empathy and hope.
If you would like to commission a portrait please contact James by email james@jamesearleyartist.com or by mobile 0044 7551616352
“The Yellow Road” is also available as a signed limited edition print, please CLICK HERE to view
