Rohan Buettel: ‘The Traveller’

The Traveller
(after the painting by Jeffrey Smart)

I

there is nothing surreal in his work

except the modern urban world

still, impassive, hyper-real

where the only true nature is man’s

the lonely city vista, the concrete streetscape

as disturbing as de Chirico

but here is the beauty of buses

on the left, bold-colour fields

green on red on yellow on buff

black tyres on grey tarmac

the apartment complex white and beige

an endless repeating pattern of balconies

caught between a light blue sky

and pink signage

II

the lines are clean and sharp and straight

the buses converge on the traveller in the middle—

middle-aged, middle-class, balding, nondescript

grey coat, blue tie under white collar

brief case in left hand, expression

neutral, mildly inquiring, not quite quizzical

the mystery is the bus on the right

its colours indeterminate, its glossy surface

reflecting and modulating, buff becomes brown

blues and greens darken, reds and yellow lighten

and in its reflections the clean

crisp lines of the surrounds are curved

for something in this work

is not quite straight

 Rohan Buettel