The Lighthouse

Description

The idea for this picture came on a visit to Star Island, where we looked out over the sea to a lighthouse that seemed to float on the water, but it was a couple years later before I began work on it, because I had not gotten a photo on that visit. I collected images of lighthouses, but none of them quite fit my image. Then last winter, on reaching for a tissue, I saw the box had a picture close enough to my vision to get me started! However, nothing I put together for the lighthouse building itself suited me, and I finally took it from one of the pictures, stretching the house part a bit wider and adding light to a couple windows and to the lighthouse beacon itself.

Then my usual question came up: how to frame the thing. I pictured a frame of driftwood, not real, but couldn’t think how to form it. I bought some wood grain cloth, with a somewhat washed out look, and cut strips, and then consulted a friend at the Frame Center (in Framingham, naturally – the next town over!) with the suggestion to sew the sticks and stuff them. Affixing it all was a major piece of hand-sewing onto a piece of foam core – rough on the fingers, but the end effect is worth it! The final touch was the addition of some tiny seashells gathered the summer before, to scatter on the beach.