Size: Original linen canvas oil painting.

127cm wide by 152cm high by 3.6cm Depth

This playful painting depicts a fairy tale landscape in Metteleuropa of romantic german castles, medieval cities and a Himalayan peaks. The work is homage to the back drop paintings from the animated movies made by the Japanese filmmaker, Hayao Miyazaki. Such as Howls Moving Castle and Castle in the Sky. In childhood Alexander saw these movies and absorbed a syncretic ideal of central Europe seen through an oriental perspective. The painting comments on the cultural blending of motifs and dream like places of childhood. The city is painted from Faller model railroad kits of the city Rothenburg ob der Tauber in the Franconia region of Bavaria. Soaring peaks of Ama Dablang loom above beckoning Alex to explore the Himalaya in paint them first before he went on to climb amongst such peaks later on in his life. These references are simultaneously deeply personal and create a sense of place for the viewer to escape to in their wildest most innocent dreams.