J Earley - Boy on Boat

I paint emotion. I always aim to create a hyperrealism painting that silently shouts and screams. There are certain scenes that I will never forget, scenes that you cannot stop thinking about. One of those scenes was on my visit to a tiny island in Bangladesh.
My visit to Bangladesh in 2022 was as a guest of the social purpose organisation Friendship. I was to see how climate change was devastating Bangladesh and this involved visiting many islands (these are called the Chars). These islands were constantly flooding and would completely disappear when the floods came. On this particular island I met the villagers and saw how they were preparing for when the floods come. I thanked them for their kindness and hospitality. I then started walking back to our small boat when I saw this child. He stood on a boat staring out at the waters. We knew that floods were coming and there was a desperate fear in the air. The silence was so loud when I saw this child. I saw fear in his eyes, he was to warn his family if he saw any signs of floods and storms. They would then all evacuate on this small wooden boat.
I knew that I had to paint this fear. I could not describe it in words and I knew that I could only express it with my paint brushes. I started priming the canvas. Then I used large brushes to paint the background, using tones that would hint at a storm. The focus was to be on the child and it is very difficult to paint such detail when the figure on the canvas is so small. I had to use specialist miniature brushes to achieve this.
I hope that anyone who views “Ripples” will glimpse the anxiety of the child, the silence of the scene and sense the huge power of the storm that was about to arrive.