"The Tractor Seat" is an early watercolor of a tractor seat that I found on a farm in western Virginia. The seat had an abstract quality to it with the beautiful patina of rusted metal. I was also intrigued by the patterns formed by it's shadow on the stump of a pine tree. Although I am thought of as a precise realist, I always look for the abstract in a composition. The geometric shapes have always fascinated me, and I have always thought that the simpler geometric compositions made the strongest images. I suppose this is a concept I first encountered in art school where we were made to study abstract composition.