Rockport, Mass. - Front Beach

"Painting of the Painter, Front Beach - Rockport, Mass." (16"X12", Oil on Canvas, $450)

This is another view of Front Beach, done in Autumn - a particularly beautiful time of year in Rockport. This time Front Beach is at full high tide, unlike in the previous post. It's also looking in the other direction, from right down on the sea wall above the beach. The granite gazebo in the background is the focal point of both paintings seen here. The wall on the left leads to a beautiful beachside home which has the gazebo as part of the property.

If this were summer, the seagulls on the rocks in the water would be waiting for the tide to lower a bit so they could raid the crab pond. It's a natural granite tidepool where tiny crabs grow and ultimately are washed out into the ocean by the tides. It's located between the two rock projections closest to shore. I used to love hunting for baby crabs in there, turning over all the stones to find them.

This view of Front Beach, with the gazebo, is a popular one with all the painters that visit and live in the area. So this guy, standing among the seaweed which accumulates on the beach and is left there over the fall and winter to protect the sand from storm erosion, is part of a tradition in east coast small town painting. The 'painting within a painting' is another tradition that lots of artists have observed, and now I'm part of it.