This is a view from memory of the place of my birth, Motherwell and shows many of the features that appear in the paintings of memories of the past and that desire to portray the landscape in the manner depicted by Bosch and Breugel.
This painting depicts the landscape with the same fidelity of that seen in the village in my painting of ‘Lot’s Wife’. The real vantage point of the picture was from my Aunt Mary’s flat on the 19th floor of Coursington Tower which swayed in the wind. But the view was tremendous and allowed you to see the world below as if it were the background to a toy train set with real people. The view from the other side of the tower took in the site of the slag heap from the Ravenscraig Steelworks.
This was a smoking desert that resembled hell on earth, humorously dubbed by the locals as the ‘Ponderosa’.
Although as stated this was done from memory, many of the features of my home town are lovingly depicted. In this portrayal of the Motherwell of my memories, the town is drawn with a warmth and humour that can be seen in the work of L S Lowry, that great depictor of the industrial landscape of Lancashire in days gone by.
