A Painters Journey

One of the great things about being a plein air painter and traveling to new locations is that the locals are often willing to share the history of a scene you are painting. Even better is when they provide access to a scene you would not ordinarily have the opportunity to paint. I've been painting in Plein Air Richmond for 4 years and like everyone who sees it am awed by the grandeur of their downtown train depot. Once we were granted access to the second floor front balcony where we could view the amazing intersection of rails and highways, but we were not allowed to paint inside. That all changed yesterday as I was wiping off a scene I had started without much enthusiasm. A woman came up to me and offered me the opportunity to paint anywhere inside the terminal. Her name was Jeannie Welliver and she is the project development manager for the City of Richmond Department of Economic &Community Development. The city is redeveloping the old train shed where at least five tracks ended where passengers boarded in the hey day of train travel. Now there are tracks that run on either side of the terminal and the few passenger trains that use the station off load their passengers outside of the terminal. The interior of the shed is being glassed in and turned into a convention hall. Jeannie gave us a short history of the area around the train station, a very sad history. It was once the site of 69 slave markets. The terminal was also the site, as the confederacy was falling, where the last trainload of human property was shipped south by the owners. Within eyesight of the terminal archeologists are uncovering an extensive slave burial ground. So today, I stood (dressed in hard hat and safety vest), and looked out over acreage that once was a bastion of the slave trade and tracks that saw millions of visitors, free and in bondage, commence or end journeys . Where the tracks that once led to the train shed now end suspended over a vast construction site, in the coming years there will be a park with appropriate homage to the unfortunates who passed through this area. So my painting, which I hope to firish tomorrow will be called Transitioning and rather than just an interesting collection of shapes, now has a story. I feel,so fortunate to have this opportunity!