Busy Beavers

The painting I'm writing about today, and posting pictures of, is a work I have titled "Busy Beavers", commemorating life at the office and a very chaotic form of office life, at that.

Busy Beavers - Oil on canvas

In this painting, everything is an accident waiting to happen as, at any moment, the beavers will either trip over the telephone cords or bump into each other, sending piles of paper flying!  No-one seems to know what anyone else is doing, there is a lack of direction and all the staff are in reactive mode! But as this is a painting, a moment frozen in time, we will never know for sure if the catastrophe happens or whether it is diffused.

This painting won an Honorable Mention in one of the Fall National Juried Art Exhibitions held at Impact Artists Gallery, in Buffalo, New York.  There were entries from all over the United States, where I was living at the time.

A couple of years later, I donated this to a fundraiser for Studio Arena Theater in Buffalo and it was purchased by the theater's then-Marketing Manager.  I don't know where it is today, but I'm assuming it is still in a private collection.

In the photos, I'm showing the painting in its entirety plus a detail from the upper right corner.  As the painting was already varnished when photos were taken, there is some distortion due to the light reflecting off the varnish.

Busy Beavers - Detail

I think most people can relate to this picture, because who among us hasn't worked, at some point, in an organization that is an accident waiting to happen?


Copyright Deborah C. Sawyer

All images copyrighted to the artist