What You See When You Squint — The Story Behind "Manhattan"
New York is not really my pace.
I say that having spent a few days there in 2015, doing everything you're supposed to do — a 14-inning baseball game between the Mets and the Pirates at Citi Field, reached via the iconic subway. Pizza in Dumbo under the Manhattan Bridge. The 9/11 Memorial, which stops you completely and asks something of you that no other place quite does. Most of the Irish bars. And finally, the observation deck of the Rockefeller Centre, looking out over the whole impossible thing.
It was windy up there. The kind of wind that makes your eyes water whether you want them to or not. And when I squinted against it and looked down at the city, something unexpected happened.
The colours transformed.
The grey concrete and glass dissolved into something electric — blues, pinks, yellows, greens — the whole density of Manhattan rendered in neon and light, like the city had been turned up past the point of realism into something that felt more honest than a photograph. Because that is how New York feels. Overwhelming. Alive. Too much and not enough at the same time.
I stood there squinting into the wind, contemplating how eight million people live and work and play in this concrete jungle every single day, and I thought: that is the painting.
Not the skyline as it looks. The skyline as it feels.
Manhattan doesn't ask you to keep up. It just keeps going, with or without you.
Bring Manhattan Into Your Space
Available as canvas, framed canvas and art print options.