RSA Scottish Art

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Small web image of HomeArtist: Andrew Cranston
Title: Home
Year: 2000
Medium: oil on canvas
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Source: RSA
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Description: Andrew Cranston is particularly interested in working directly from his surroundings, aiming to paint his own reactions to his environment; and these are sometimes unexpected or even macabre.Home was painted in Finland during a visit there on scholarship. It is a natural enough view from a wooden porch with a diver's suit hanging out to dry against a backdrop of trees. However, the artist is interested in the way the viewer interprets this image – the diver's suit at first glance can look very like a man hanging. This grisly interpretation of the scene is heightened when the viewer realises that the figure has no feet. The extremely unsettling idea of a person hanging outside the house is made even more potent by the apparent normality of the bright porch and attractive garden. The title then can convey two meanings; Home – a place of familiarity and easiness with the surroundings, or a more surreal Home – where familiarity is disturbed by the possible meaning of the suit/figure to the ordinariness around it.The composition is powerful and focuses attention directly onto the figure. The square formed by the porch is the central feature. Not only do the lines of the floorboards draw the eye towards the square, but the framed patch of garden and the diving suit are painted in rich strident colours that contrast strongly with the pale lilac porch. The composition is a little claustrophobic, as the viewer is looking at the scene from within the box-shaped enclosure of the porch. All of these factors contribute to the tension of the painting.The painting has been executed in quite a matter-of-fact fashion, without drama or expressive brushstrokes. The tonal range is quite wide, and the scene is rendered in a stark, powerful palette. It is the very simple, almost bland quality of the painting which lends the scene so much power and mystery.