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As I teenager in Saskatoon, I used to loiter around the ivy-covered, University of Saskatchewan on weekends. I "audited" classes, snooped, and generally watched the grown ups get educated. I remember spending part of a Sunday breathlessly watching a Fine Arts student try to figure out the one right place to place a little black spot on a big white canvas. My recollection is that it was an actual assignment, but I couldn't stay long enough to see the student's solution, So, all these decades later I was happy to see that a local Fairview painter had tackled much the same problem.


The varied thickness of the paint is visually very effective, particularly in the case of the black "fly-speck." The irregular shape almost makes it look like it changes position as the viewer changes their position. Unfortunately when I tried to take a straight on photo of the painting, the black spot apparently fell off, which may explain why the artist threw the painting out; the technique, though bold, is still quite flawed. Ah, well. Bravo, I say, Full marks for the effort. Click the images to enlarge them.