Originally I took a completely different approach. I pictured something more like a Japanese print. Just a field of umbrellas, seen from above, almost like little flowers.
Roger, our professor, suggested something more surrealist and large, more like the stuff that Magritte has done.

I ended up taking a piece of the skyline in Solvay, and taking a seagull, and having him play with the umbrella, rather than having him fly around. Giving it a more singular point of attention.

You might say I'm stereotyping Syracuse weather. Things are gloomy, gray and overcast, as people like to accuse it of being. I don't know—I kind of like it.