This painting in ‘grisaille’ is a remembrance of times past.

Abandoned and forgotten places fascinate me, and this subject got my attention immediately. The title of the painting is derived from a note that was taped to the front door of this abandoned farmhouse in Nebraska. This work was commissioned by Vince and Natalie Bower—the farm was in Natalie’s family.

The French have a term for this technique: Grisaille, a painting rendered entirely in shades of grey. Since the source photo was only in black and white, this was an ideal opportunity to create a painting with no color, and concentrate only on values of light and dark.

But of course, it’s the narrative created by this old farmhouse that is the most intriguing. Who lived here and for how long? Was it a home filled with love, laughter and warm memories? Why did the people who lived here move away? The title helps to answer that last question.

Aesthetically, there are many interesting elements, and other unanswered questions. The overgrown yard, overtaking the open front gate. The peeling paint. And what is that shredded-looking cloth hanging from the right side of the fence? Is it an old jacket? A towel? Why was it left there?

The electric wires and TV antenna place the house firmly in the latter half of the twentieth century. Without those items, this farmhouse could be from the 1930s or earlier.

The original photo cropped out the far left edge of the house, so I added to the background there. This helps to isolate the subject even more, giving it a greater feeling of loneliness. I also added more to the trees and farmyard on the right. Compositionally, these changes were important to help define the setting and create mood and atmosphere.

Relatively speaking, this is a big painting. I prefer to work on larger canvases because they make a statement. The larger size of this work also helped keep my brushwork loose and almost gestural. In my experience, smaller canvases lead to tighter, less-expressive work.

I learned that this particular farm was the home of George and Etha Hitchcock, who were Natalie’s grandparents. For many years, they hosted large family gatherings, filling the small house to overflowing on holidays. Later on, Natalie’s parents moved back into the old house after they were married. But eventually, they too left the farm and “moved to the house south of here.”

Like much of my recent work, this subject reminds me of my own past, and the old farmhouses in my family. My father’s parents, Lyle and Anna Marlow, lived for many years on a farm southwest of Boxholm, Iowa, west of Ames. As a boy, our family spent every Christmas and Easter on the Marlow farm. Happy memories of laughing with my cousins, dying Easter eggs with Grandma Anna, playing with Grandpa Lyle’s antique pinball machine or driving around the farm on grandpa’s 3-wheeler—memories that make me smile. My grandparents died over 30 years ago, so at the same time, I feel a tinge of sadness, knowing that I will never experience these things again on the old Marlow farmstead.

Many abandoned farmhouses, like the old Hitchcock place, eventually disappear. Their farmyards are plowed under and become cornfields. That’s why it’s important to capture these old homes before they are erased from existence. They were not only a family’s home—they help to tell the story of rural America.

Portraying this old abandoned farmhouse on canvas reminds me that there can be intrinsic beauty in places and things that have been left behind.