Stairway to Heaven – Original Painting

Abstract inspired by a carved wooden staircase which had been salvaged and was on display in the Victoria and Albert museum. I couldn’t help think of the song Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeppelin.
There’s a lady who’s sure all that glitters is gold and she’s buying a stairway to heaven.

Or so the song goes and kept on going in my head when I saw this staircase in the Victoria and Albert Museum .

I said to my friend “This is going to be a painting one day”,

I was drawn to the contrast of the contemporary glazing with the ancient wooden carving the setting of two opposites together and took this rather dark picture on my phone with no flash. But more than that, the staircase as a metaphor is something that intrigues me. And this one more than most.

This staircase once went somewhere.

It was part of a building. The building is gone now but here it is, incomplete, going nowhere. There are many analogies I could draw:

• The futility of carving an elaborate path but not paying attention to where it goes.

• Of living in the shoes of another, following a beautiful pathway created by someone else that ultimately gets you where you don’t want to be.

• The finality of life, this once went somewhere but now it doesn’t. It ended!

• Of looking at purpose out of context. This once went somewhere and made sense but now it’s been taken away from its environment and is like a fish out of water.

And now it is this painting.